SINGAPORE, Oct 26 — It’s a tradition for my family. Every year on the eve of this festival, we’ll haphazardly clean the house all afternoon and, as the sun sets, light some lamps and head to Serangoon Road for the real celebration.
For the past years, throwing ourselves into the colour, light and sound of this little enclave has been the highlight of my holiday.
At university, I volunteered to bring exchange students on this ride from Campbell Lane to Syed Alwi, with coconut vendors, T-shirt hawkers, kebab makers and — at the stroke of midnight — complete and utter mayhem. Strangers hugging each other, confetti in every direction, poppers going off as we all chant a collective “Happy Deepavali.”
Last year, my husband — newly acquired — joined my family for the first time.
And he was surprised by the sheer size of the festivities. From Bukit Timah Road right down to Lavender Road, there are lights, music, cheers, and shoppers throng the fairs brimming with little stalls. On the streets, the foreign workers far away from home find a way to rejoice anyway, singing, dancing, twirling with sparklers.
There is nothing like it; it’s all smiles and there is a deep sense of community and belonging that fills you. Or rather, there was nothing like it, because this year the Deepavali in Little India was a much more muted and sedate affair. And I suspect this is largely due to the aftermath of the riots that unfolded in December last year, following which large swathes of the area were zoned as alcohol-free on the eve public holidays (among other days)
I know some of you may say that to suggest the entire spirit of the celebration is dependent on spirits is derisive to the community. But that misses the point of my argument. What I am saying is this: the community has now become very fragmented and this Deepavali, to me, made those divisions clearer than ever.
This year’s celebrations were a let-down because I yearned for the boisterous, almost-defiant spirit of previous years. My family had bought poppers and poised ourselves at the mouth of Campbell Lane waiting for the crowd to go wild (as it had in all the previous years) at midnight. But actually not much happened. There were a couple of enthusiastic revellers, but most people carried on shopping and the occasional hoot was made half-heartedly.
Nothing encapsulated this better than when the meek midnight ushering was suddenly contrasted with an impromptu parade of trucks all chugging down the one-way street, blaring their horns evoking all the energy of what it used to be and what it ought to be. And it seemed to me like an obvious truth: We are all poorer without this robust energy.
Surely everyone would agree?
I was wrong. At the many festive gatherings that followed, I raised this point with my family and friends, and was surprised to hear so many disagree.
A cousin said he believed the ban on alcohol and the subsequent “taming” of the area was an overwhelmingly positive development. Another friend dismissed the entire affair as something “those foreign workers do-lah. Not us.”
Asking around, I have found this to be a common point-of-view: That we are different from them. And in each instance the “we” and the “them” has varied.
Some have placed themselves in the category of the middle class with nothing in common with migrant workers, while others have even more narrowly identified themselves as North Indians, with these street shenanigans the purview of the South Indians. And there are those with economic interests who are keen to see the area rid of the low-spending lot who only serve to keep away the more valuable, affluent consumer.
Personally I think here lies the problem, this determination to differentiate ourselves from each other. We have allowed so many divisions to cleave through the community: Singapore Indian, Indian-expat, Indian worker, north Indian, south Indian.
Of course diversity and division characterise India itself but in Singapore, for the longest time, Deepavali tied the whole community, from the humble foreign worker to the prosperous businesses that sponsored the light-ups. So, to see it fray reflects on the health of the community as a whole.
Numerically, our numbers remain reasonably constant, but these conversations have left me asking if we are soon to be so fragmented that the “community” I spent so many years being a part of will quickly become a thing of the past?
*This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
