As we are moving forward to become a tourism hub, the current weekend Filipino hangout along Lucky Plaza and Takashimaya stretch may not be too appropriate. Can look into relocating them to a near city area or probably even create a town concept call “Filipino Town or “Little Philippines” where shopping centres and parks are available for them to shop and fellowship. This town concept may even be extended to other foreign worker group and it may even evolve to become a new tourist attraction where different ethnic towns are found.
The foreign workers hangout are getting more and more interesting and they are creating a niche area of culture, adding colours to the diverse Singapore landscape. Instead of viewing them as trouble or people who added inconvenience to our routine. We should see how we can create these areas into tourist spots, providing more amenities for the foreign workers to continue their gathering or bringing "country" theme fairs to do up the atmosphere of the area. This is a way we can show appreciation to the workers for contributing to our economy; at the same time bringing in more tourist money. Among the more established foreign workers, those on the higher income group, we can see that they have also created for themselves nice spots, Liang Court and The Central for Japanese, Velocity for the Koreans, Holland V for the "Ang Mo" and such. The other areas that we can help to make over are Golden Mile for the Thais workers, Jurong area/ Geyland for the Chinese workers, Lucky Plaza for the Philippines workers and etc… I am sure there are more. There “foreign prime lands” are great tourist spots and in the same time creating a truly globalised landscape in Singapore.
hey good idea to remake Golden mile to a Thai hangout. Perhaps can relocate the "coach station" from golden mile to somewhere else too. Refer to Anthony's idea on building an international coach station.
hmmm, sounding almost xenophobic there. I think if S'pore is moving towards a tourism hub, the government's planning and policies should be adequate enough to create a unique Singapore branding that is strong enough to "overcome" any other possible influences? It is unless they create inconveniences like traffic congestion or increase in crime rate then relocation could be a solution
Inconveniences should be part and parcel of life. Sometimes we are so focused on efficiency, that we forget to give time for organic growth. So many colourful parts of Singapore had/ have been destroyed in the name of efficiency and modernisation. But culture and branding needs time to grow. Sometimes, the more inconvenience it is, the more deep-rooted and effect it has. Human behaviours should not be always so orderly. We are created differently. Anyone in tourism board looking at this thread?
having a town concept is good.at least there is a focal point for our transient workers to gather and interact.but however,but if the transient workers wants to hangout other than the allocated town concept,they should be allowed to do so.i dun see it inappropriate for them to hangout along popular tourist attraction and i felt that this is quite discriminatory.
It would be a great idea to have an area recognised officially as LITTLE MANILA, LITTLE THAILAND, LITTLE JAPAN. foreign workers are apart of our nation and contribute to building a modern Singapore. We have areas that recognise China town, Little India and Arab street. These areas were once built by its foreign community living and working in colonial Singapore.
Maybe I comment from an 'Ang Mo' point of view. Cultural diversity is one of Singapores biggest assets, in one day you can experience so many different lifestyles, cultures,foods, religions, temples..... in which the 'tourists' appreciate. This is why Little India, Chinatowns all over the world are top tourist destinations. Tourists want to see and breathe this diversity in which all walks of life are contributing to. To suggest that any group of people should be moved in order to make the place look better is not only xenophobic but also not nice. We live in a democratic society (luckily) where we all have equal rights to where we choose to hang out. Live and let live.
I think the idea of Little Thailand, etc is good.. these places are already formed, by their own accord. The least we need is official directives and policy to find a new place and then mark this or that area as an ethnic enclave.
The area around Beach Rd is a Thai enclave, that around Peninsula Plaza is Burmese. Let the Filipinos and Indonesians gravitate to the area they find most comfortable in and then allow them to flourish. This was how the Thai became entrenched around the Beach Rd area. Once entrenched, perhaps the authorities can then step in with policies to favour setting up of supporting services for such ethnic groups. If we want to make Singapore vibrant and a welcoming places for people to put down roots, I suppose this would be one first step.
I think that a proper location is a good idea, the Japanese hang out is clean and respectable, nice restaurants, nice food, polite quiet people and no litter.. people are not sitting on the floor, painting their toenails and eating cheap bread from tuppaware containers whilst waiting to pick up labourers for a "quickie" in the undergrowth when the sun sets... also they are not drinking whisky from bottles and blocking the walkway for pedestrians.. this is NOT a good example to show tourists who wish to drop money (and Sinagpore's lifeline) in shopping malls. I used to live across the road from Takashimaya and was embarrassed to go out on a Sunday when family was here due to the "refugee camp" that was busy getting plastered on the sidewalk ! Having a designated area with facilities may alleviate this and also it may show that these other groups have culture and cuisine and not display them as "bottom of the barrel" dregs who act and look like streetwalkers ! That is another prime example that SG will never qualify as 1st world... 5th Ave in NY, the Champs Elysees in Paris and Bond St in London do not have such vile displays !!
'prime example that Singapore will never qualify as 1st world'? either you are a shallow foreigner here or just another typical singaporean with a bad case of elitistic idealogy.
what does a 1st world necessarily encompass to be a first class nation? first of all, those countries that you mentioned have a long history to begin with and their populations are almost homogenous in nature.
singapore itself is a unique city-state with multi-racial population. Should there be anything that puts Singapore to a test in being a first world country, it is the tolerance for the existence of a diversity of ethnicities and races.
your display of distaste for 'refugee campings' in town area just shows your low level of understanding of the unique culture in Singapore. If you have that much of grievances and shame in living in this city-state, doors are widely open for the escapsim of your myopic perspective of things.
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