I’ve always loved Raffles Place. When I was a little girl, it was a place that I went to every Saturday morning to wait for my late father to knock off from work and we would have lunch at the old hawker centre by the river. There were still bumboats plying the length of the river and the tallest building was OCBC. Raffles Place = Being a big girl and working there like what Daddy did.

After my A Levels, I got to intern with JP Morgan on the now defunct Simex floor. It was a very heady feeling as I watched the traders shouting at the top of their voices in the trading pit and I ran to and fro to collect tickets to enter into the system. It was a place where insane amounts of money exchanged hands. My mentors called it Singapore’s largest gambling floor. I was there when the Japanese PM Hosokawa resigned and the Nikkei index crashed within minutes and the phones on the floor rang instantaneously like the siren. Traders sprinted back to the trading floor from half eaten lunches and the entire place simply went nuts. Hey, I even sat next to the notorious Nick Leeson! Ok lar. He was sitting at the next booth and his house colour was a reddish maroon colour. AND, I got to have lunch with Daddy every week as a big girl!

When I grew up, my dream came true! I finally worked at the heart of Raffles Place for 14 years. It was all hustle and bustle. Everyone who worked here probably were sprinters when they were in school, they walked faster in high (very high) heels faster than anyone else in fit flops in the heartlands. My friend once said that her heart beat like 2x faster whenever she came to have lunch with me at Raffles Place.

Towards the end of the my working years at Raffles Place, I wondered, “Don’t all these people ever get tired? Rushing from point to point. Always da-baoing the food from the kiosks and then eating and working at the computers (well, that was what I did).”Or maybe, it was just me. I was work weary of the numbing busyness, office politicking (why kill my brain cells over people who don’t matter?), dumb decisions made by management, and well, everything.

After that, I only went back to Raffles Place once a week for my Yoga classes (bo bian, I signed on a 2 year contract while I was still working there and I liked the Yoga teachers…. so….) I was practically looking at the Raffles Place workers from the other side of the fish tank. While everyone was dressed up to the nines in suits and dresses, I was strolling around at 1/4 of the walking speed in yoga getup and flip flops. I enjoyed the feeling that I had the choice of walking at that tortoise speed. I liked sitting at the cafeteria with my book and SLOWLY (haha this is the crux) chewing my food while people around me were eating at thrice my speed and then rushing back to the office.

And then, covid struck. The yoga place closed due to lockdown. Eventually when it reopened, I had a shoulder injury and I couldn’t even lift my arm beyond 45 degrees (ya, very difficult to wear my bra!). I put off seeing the doctor as the pain was bearable until it became a major inconvenience (cannot wear bra lah!). Then when I was finally fixed by the TCM doctor, (that’s another story full of pain), inertia and procrastination set in. I had dinner with my friend who went on and on about the amount of money I was losing (paying for the membership and not using it) until it became a major OUCH! and I booked a yoga class the next day.

So, here I am. Back at Raffles Place after being away for so long. I have never seen Raffles Place so empty before. All the suits are probably working from home. Even the sardines at the MRT station have disappeared. Check out how empty the station is and I could even get a seat on the MRT to read my book!

Raffles Place has changed over the years, so have I. But I wish that I could turn back the clock and be the little girl who was waiting for her father to knock off work to have lunch with her, because it meant that he was still around. I miss you, Daddy!