[h=1]Why Singaporeans must not take peace here for granted[/h]
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my paper
Friday, Aug 12, 2011
By Angeline Eng Radley
I NEVER expected the riots here to come so close to home. Richard (my British husband) and I, with our two young sons, recently moved to - what you would consider - an affluent part of London.
Nestled in a small green conservation area, it is a little oasis in the grey and grimy capital.
However, like many parts of London, it is also "rough" in bits - rich and poor live side by side, a legacy of the United Kingdom's social housing policy. Our home is in Lewisham Borough, where, on Monday night, rioters burnt cars and bins on the high street.
My children and I walked to this very same street just last week, where I went to the bank and post office, and bought some fruit from the vendor at the street market.
We had heard of the trouble in Tottenham last Saturday night but didn't think much of it. Having lived through something on the scale of Sept 11 and then 7/7 in London, a couple of protesters reacting to the police shooting of an alleged gang member just didn't quite register highly on the alarm scale. How wrong I was.
On Monday night, I turned on the news just after dinner and that was when a mild panic set in - was that really Lewisham High Street where there are cars on fire? It was surreal, seeing a place I had been only a few days before, all empty except for the riot police.
I called my husband at work immediately, ordered him home and told him to avoid Lewisham at all costs. Then came more reports of looting and fires all over London. A tight knot sat in my stomach till my husband walked in an hour and a half later. All we did that night was sit glued to the TV.
The next day, we tried to carry on as normal, but noticed shops were closed, and people were even boarding up their shops in anticipation of more trouble that night. We went to our local park, which was eerily quiet for a beautiful summer afternoon in London.
We continued to the library - closed too. We went to the local supermarket, and it was closing. There was a definite sense of unease in the air.
As we put the kids to bed, the sound of choppers going and coming in the darkening sky was very audible. This, and the sound of sirens, became oursoundtrack for the night. Then came the news that Eltham (an area not far from us) was full of vigilantes out to protect their high street.
These are notorious football fans and rumours of a racist element, with English Defence League involvement, started circulating on Twitter. The last thing we needed now was a race war.
It was a tense night as rumours of a march from Eltham to Lewisham organised by a group with a race agenda kept circulating all night. It didn't happen but, if it did, the route would have taken them less than a five minutes' walk to our doorstep.
Amid all the tension, it was heartening to hear stories of Londoners uniting to make a stand against the rioters - Turkish shopkeepers in Dalston protecting their businesses; Sikh men, young and old, standing tall outside their temples in Southall; men patrolling the streets late into the night in Enfield and clean-ups organised by local people.
I know how these people feel; if looters had turned up at my doorstep, I would have defended my home to the very end.
But, mostly, I am angry. That these kids-turned-looters have destroyed many innocent people's lives. Lives and livelihoods were lost, for no reason other than greed.
I am sure that the repercussions of the 2011 riots will be felt for a long time, and it may turn out to be the wake-up call Britain needs.
As a Londoner, I know London will get back on her feet. There is no question; it is not one of the world's greatest cities for nothing. It has survived worse.
As a Singaporean, how does all this make me feel? I've always defended Singapore's conservative politics. And I watched the recent Singapore election with interest. It makes me feel heartened that my generation of Singaporeans has taken a real interest in politics.
However, there is a tinge of worry there too - our generation is largely untouched by political and social unrest. It is easy to demand more freedom, but, in the last few days, we have seen what happens when a government is too liberal and parents lose their authority. And it will take years to rebuild society in the aftermath.
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my paper
Friday, Aug 12, 2011
By Angeline Eng Radley
I NEVER expected the riots here to come so close to home. Richard (my British husband) and I, with our two young sons, recently moved to - what you would consider - an affluent part of London.
Nestled in a small green conservation area, it is a little oasis in the grey and grimy capital.
However, like many parts of London, it is also "rough" in bits - rich and poor live side by side, a legacy of the United Kingdom's social housing policy. Our home is in Lewisham Borough, where, on Monday night, rioters burnt cars and bins on the high street.
My children and I walked to this very same street just last week, where I went to the bank and post office, and bought some fruit from the vendor at the street market.
We had heard of the trouble in Tottenham last Saturday night but didn't think much of it. Having lived through something on the scale of Sept 11 and then 7/7 in London, a couple of protesters reacting to the police shooting of an alleged gang member just didn't quite register highly on the alarm scale. How wrong I was.
On Monday night, I turned on the news just after dinner and that was when a mild panic set in - was that really Lewisham High Street where there are cars on fire? It was surreal, seeing a place I had been only a few days before, all empty except for the riot police.
I called my husband at work immediately, ordered him home and told him to avoid Lewisham at all costs. Then came more reports of looting and fires all over London. A tight knot sat in my stomach till my husband walked in an hour and a half later. All we did that night was sit glued to the TV.
The next day, we tried to carry on as normal, but noticed shops were closed, and people were even boarding up their shops in anticipation of more trouble that night. We went to our local park, which was eerily quiet for a beautiful summer afternoon in London.
We continued to the library - closed too. We went to the local supermarket, and it was closing. There was a definite sense of unease in the air.
As we put the kids to bed, the sound of choppers going and coming in the darkening sky was very audible. This, and the sound of sirens, became oursoundtrack for the night. Then came the news that Eltham (an area not far from us) was full of vigilantes out to protect their high street.
These are notorious football fans and rumours of a racist element, with English Defence League involvement, started circulating on Twitter. The last thing we needed now was a race war.
It was a tense night as rumours of a march from Eltham to Lewisham organised by a group with a race agenda kept circulating all night. It didn't happen but, if it did, the route would have taken them less than a five minutes' walk to our doorstep.
Amid all the tension, it was heartening to hear stories of Londoners uniting to make a stand against the rioters - Turkish shopkeepers in Dalston protecting their businesses; Sikh men, young and old, standing tall outside their temples in Southall; men patrolling the streets late into the night in Enfield and clean-ups organised by local people.
I know how these people feel; if looters had turned up at my doorstep, I would have defended my home to the very end.
But, mostly, I am angry. That these kids-turned-looters have destroyed many innocent people's lives. Lives and livelihoods were lost, for no reason other than greed.
I am sure that the repercussions of the 2011 riots will be felt for a long time, and it may turn out to be the wake-up call Britain needs.
As a Londoner, I know London will get back on her feet. There is no question; it is not one of the world's greatest cities for nothing. It has survived worse.
As a Singaporean, how does all this make me feel? I've always defended Singapore's conservative politics. And I watched the recent Singapore election with interest. It makes me feel heartened that my generation of Singaporeans has taken a real interest in politics.
However, there is a tinge of worry there too - our generation is largely untouched by political and social unrest. It is easy to demand more freedom, but, in the last few days, we have seen what happens when a government is too liberal and parents lose their authority. And it will take years to rebuild society in the aftermath.
