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In EN5231 I try to hold a walking tour each semester. In part, the tour is related to the notion of the city as a place of the modern--think of your reading of Marx here-- and especially in trying to get us to think of Singapore as a city made up of many waves of modernization or layers of modernity. In part, it's just a way to get to know each other in a more informal setting, and to get the chance--whether we've lived in Singapore for years or have just arrived--to get to know the city from a new angle.
I normally manage to get some funding for the tour so that so there will a nominal or small charge only-- at the moment I think about $5--for the tour. Our guide will be Geraldene Lowe, who is a mine of information about Singapore's past and present.
At the moment I am leaving the information from the last tour, in September 2008, up on the web in order for you to get an idea of the scope of such touurs: it's unlikely we'll go back to the same place. Attendance is entirely voluntary.
[2008 information below--not that this does not refer to the February 2010 tour]
This year Geraldene has proposed that we go to Chinatown, and see preparations for the Mid Autumn Festival. Even if you're familar with Chinese traditions, this will be an interesting tour, because the area is also a conservation area that bears witness to a variety of pasts and transformations: we'll meet at a Hindu temple, and pass by the oldest mosque in Singapore.
We'll meet at we meet 1.50pm at Sri Mariamman Temple on the corner South Bridge Rd & Pagoda St. ready to start at 2pm so we can have our tour and reach the traditional moocake bakery on Telok Ayer St before they close 5pm. In case anyone is late Geraldene will be will talking through an introduction for first the first ten minutes at the side of the Temple on Pagoda St --we won't get moving until 2.00 p.m.
If you are coming by MRT, Chinatown MRT Station is other end of Pagoda St and there is a taxi stop in front of Temple.
The tour will end at Telok Ayer St at around 5.00 p.m.: there is a taxi stop opposite and it is just a short walk to Raffles Place MRT.
Last updated: 12 July, 2009