Singapore Swing (30 page)

‘Is the birthday boy here?' I ask him and I have to repeat it, because the DJ at the back has pumped up the volume tonight.

Before he can answer, a round, rouged-up face with long, false eyelashes that could be construed as a deadly weapon kisses me on the cheek.

‘I'm he-
ere
!' he pouts and shouts. ‘Thanks for coming,
dahling
, mwah, mwah.'

I hardly recognise Dan. Jackie Chan was never his model in the masculinity stakes, but, but...

‘You are in drag,' I tell him, feeling stupid for stating the obvious.

‘Not yet
dah-ling
, not yet,' he says, blowing me kisses as he disappears in the crowd and a good crowd it is, too: for a Sunday night the place is full. What happened to the Asian work ethic?

It's early and I am not drunk and, as I sit in Tantric's oh-so-familiar forecourt to escape that accursed Singaporean air conditioning, my mind wanders off on its own.The city-state is only forty-something and, like a grand Hollywood actress, she is at the peak of her beauty. She is rich, successful but also wiser and more experienced. No wrinkles, double-chins or bags under the eyes detract from her perfect aspect and any contemplation of future facelifts is fanciful, remote. More than ever, our diva is also at the peak of her professional prowess: she can dictate her own terms, choose the scripts carefully, and start directing films herself. The PAP government, like a dutiful husband who has managed her from her poor beginnings, sits back and watches her achievements with pride. Hollywood being Hollywood, of course, the tongues are wagging lethally. They wonder how the couple have stuck it together for so long and, instead of admiring their resilience, they claim that she wants a divorce, but her husband is using dirty tricks to keep her from running to the lawyers. Some decry her husband's unscrupulous business techniques: producing new blockbusters is not enough – he wants to grind the competition to the ground as well. But then, what do you expect from Hollywood?

‘Vodka jellies?'

Richard is going around offering customers these lethal concoctions. They are free and they are perfect. ‘So difficult to get them right,' he says, and I have never seen him so proud. ‘You can't use too much vodka ‘cos they won't set. You have to get the balance exactly right.'

It's all a question of balance, yes, and it hurts the liberal in me to admit that on balance Singapore has got it more right than wrong and that its version of democracy deserves to be examined rather than dismissed out of hand. Take detention without trial, where the normal response is the knee-jerk ‘can't condone it': like Singapore itself, it deserves a second look. The Internal Security Act was set up in 1948 by the British during the communist insurgency in Malaya. Post-independence, it's been invoked only twice for threats against the state, more recently against the terrorists of Jemaah Islamiyah to prevent a Bali-like atrocity. Even then things are not so black-and-white: under the Act each case is reviewed every two years and detainees are discharged when ‘
they do not pose a significant security threat
'. One of them has already been released for ‘
responding positively to religious counselling
': Ali Ridhaa bin Abdullah, a Muslim convert whose original name was Andrew Gerald. There is a criminal variant of this act that broke the back of the Chinese secret societies which operate as clandestinely as terrorist cells; Lee Kuan Yew himself has said that this was the most difficult task he faced after independence. Singapore must be the only place in the world – including London – where Triad gangsterism has been routed.

It's easy to dismiss such laws with a specious sense of European superiority. But keep in mind our reaction to our own anti-terrorism acts: once threatened, did we not readily accept an erosion of our rights to prevent a greater disaster? Do we not clap and cheer for the hero in Hollywood films when he steals a car in order to prevent a lethal explosion? In Singapore, the conundrum ‘does the end justify the means' has been answered with a resounding ‘yes' whereas we, in the West, are still wrestling in the dark with the dilemma.

The racket inside draws me back in. A spotlight hits a makeshift stage and a tarted up Dan, complete in a black bouffant, tight red dress and false boobs, starts mouthing the lyrics to One Night Only – more Jennifer Hudson than Ricky Martin. The whole bar is whistling approvingly, and someone next to me asks me whether I know the name of the act. Certainly Dan looks professional enough: he is strutting about confidently with the right dose of camp and competence. It's all, as we agreed, a question of balance.

But hey,
a change of costume
! That black bouffant lasts only for the slow part of the song; Dan disappears for a second and
wa lao,
he's back with a tighter white dress and a platinum blond wig – it's Madonna! He finishes with an up-tempo Beyoncé mix of the song and, as we applaud rowdily, I can't help thinking that such death-defeating exuberance can only emerge from a death-defying experience.

The DJ asks us if we want an encore. We cry ‘Yes' and Dan steps into a gymnastically perfect ‘Vogue'. His timing is perfect: how long does he spend miming to Madonna videos? I am rendered speechless as he swings his hips and moves his arms around his head with perfect panache. He is so larger-than-life that when he takes a bow the girl next to me shakes her head.

‘Is that all?' she says. ‘Is that the show?'

I turn to her, explain the situation and she's impressed. She is Japanese, from Tokyo. There is a mixed party of them here. They look a bit demure.

‘We went to the Powerhouse, but they wouldn't let us in. Private party.'

Oh, no! This is my last Sunday in Singapore and I really, really want to go to the superclub by the Harbourfront, a converted power station that's become the hottest night in town. Damn! Why did I wait until today?

I help Dan down, abuzz with the excitement of his triumph, and kiss him. ‘You were
fabulous
,' I say and mean it. ‘Is this the beginning of a second career or what?'

‘Don' be silly,' he laughs. ‘You come with us to Powerhouse later? Goes on till fo' in the morning.'

I point at the Japanese. ‘The guys there have been already. There is a private party tonight.'

Dan winks at me: ‘They say that to people they don' wan' in.'

Oh.

‘Come outside, we have a bottle of champagne and then we go to the club.'

I hate this American teen word but I will use it anyway: the Powerhouse was
awesome
.

Of course, being let in to any venue that has just barred a party of younger and more beautiful people would be enough for me to sing its praises, but the Powerhouse really is the Godzilla of all clubs. A cross between a warehouse and a grand arena, the place oozes presence; imagine a rave at Battersea Power Station and you get the picture. Dozens of illuminated structures and a beehive of lighted squares on our left compete with the abstract back-projections on our right. The tribal house sound is as clean and as technically perfect as can be outside the digital showrooms of the Funan Centre. Eight-hundred-odd punters are crammed on the dancefloor, on the overlooking balconies, in its various nooks and corners. To top it all, we don't have go-go dancers; we have go-go trapeze artists who display their aerial acrobatics above us without a safety net – I suppose we are it. You'd expect this in LA or Tokyo but not in an unfashionable corner of South East Asia. It doesn't look like it's going to remain like that much longer – someone tell the Beckhams: Singapore is well and truly swinging.

I lose Dan almost immediately and roam around drunk. Cocktails, coke, beer: everything is cheaper in pitchers and, this being Singapore, nobody says no to a bargain. Well, I do: like hell I am going to hold one of those monsters on the dancefloor, so I order a normal-size vodka and tonic. I am served reasonably quickly but wait interminably for my change; by the time it arrives I have almost finished my drink and I haven't moved away from the bar. Instead of working myself into a fit, I sigh with resigned sentimentality. There is always a place in Singapore where some choreography is attached to ordering. Here, the barman puts your dollars in a leather folder and hands them to a cashier at the end of the bar, along with your order sheet. It is the cashier – always a woman, why? – who handles the payment. It makes some sort of sense until you realise that, in practice, the folders stack upwards and the queuing is ‘first in, last out': if too many people use the bar after you, you've had it.

Clumsily, I turn and spill what's left of my drink onto a guy's shirt by accident. I apologise. He nods unperturbed and continues talking to his mate.

I squint.
It can't be… Yes, it can!

‘Excuse me,' I say, knowing in advance my question will sound stupid, ‘you are chewing gum.'

They look at each other. ‘Yeah,' says the culprit who is sporting a goatee.

‘But I was told you can't buy gum in Singapore.'

The guy picks up a packet of Wrigley's from his top pocket and draws back the silver foil to offer me a piece.

‘Thanks, I'm drinking alcohol,' I excuse myself, slurring my words. ‘I will only swallow it and it will get stuck in a corner of my bowels where it can only be flushed with a colonic.'

They both look at me suspiciously and leave. I wonder if they were dealers. They certainly tried to push their gear.

Jimmy James' ‘Fashionista' hits the decks and I can't believe it; people on the podiums are mouthing the words with the ease Dan mimed Madonna: ‘
New York, London, Paris, Milan/Tokyo, I think it's in Japan.
' These dancing girls and boys have known nothing but the PAP and nothing but prosperity, and I wonder what's going on in their heads that are woggling weakly to the rhythm: ‘
Asia, Malaysia, Las Vegas to play/LA, if you pay my way.
' Do they care about politics or have they given up altogether because it's not advisable to raise their heads above the parapet? The West has been scorned by the Asian tiger economies for caring more about abstract human rights than real, concrete ones like poverty and hunger: get the people fed first and free them later, they counter in unison. Alright, fine. So what happens now that the only hungry souls in Singapore are ghosts wandering aimlessly during the seventh lunar month?

I always leave Singapore with a question more subtle than the last one.

- 37 -

South Boat Quay's godowns are so Disney-drawn that they feel like an urban planner's folly, set as they are against the glass-and-metal skymonsters of the CBD. Yet they have been there forever – well, since Raffles reclaimed the unhealthy swampland that covered that tract of the rivermouth. For half a century about three quarters of Singapore's freight business was transacted through this small strip of land, until the late 1860s when Keppel Harbour started handling the new Suez Canal traffic. Nowadays, I wouldn't blink if I learned that Boat Quay might well be responsible for three quarters of the tourist restaurant turnover. There is many a museum that a threeday-tourist en route to Australia may miss, but everyone is sure to dine al fresco at Boat Quay.

I meet Jacky at Harry's Bar, which became internationally famous as Nick Leeson's favourite watering hole, although his most legendary escapade (mooning at a party of Singapore Airlines' stewardesses) occurred at Off Quay, a few doors up.

Ah, the Leeson case; it has become part of Singapore folklore. What with
Rogue Trader
, the book and subsequent movie starring Ewan McGregor, everyone knows how historic Barings – bankers to the Queen and fund managers of the 1803 Louisiana Purchase – collapsed in 1995 after Nick Leeson lost millions and diverted the losses to a clandestine account. Leeson fled Singapore in order not to face charges here and was arrested in Germany hoping to be tried in the UK. But being a rogue trader means exactly that: the boys in the city didn't try too hard for his extradition and let him sweat it out in Singapore where he was sent down for six-and-a-half years. After serving just over half his sentence, Leeson – suffering from colon cancer and having lost his wife who divorced him – was let free; on the night of his release, a party was held at Harry's Bar which he, unsurprisingly, did not attend. Having survived the disease, he remarried and moved to Ireland, where he is now general manager of Galway United and enjoys his status as an after-dinner speaker. In a recent interview, he said he is considering going back to trading full-time. You've been warned.

Still, he is one of the most iconic figures associated with Singapore. He represents not only the greedy face of unfettered capitalism that encompassed the island and the whole of Asia in the 1990s, but also the maturing of Singapore's financial structures. It was the local regulator that eventually discovered Leeson's scam and it was Singapore's not the Bank of England's report into the scandal that was more highly rated more among the City eggheads– including Nick Leeson himself. The whole sorry episode, if anything, strengthened the reputation of the city-state as a place to do business.