THE ATMOSPHERE inside Singapore's main stadium was intense. It was National Day. It was midway through the biggest parade in the city-state's annual calendar and the place was packed with citizens screaming with patriotic fervour.
As the temperature rose, the master of ceremonies paused to ask the crowd to take a drink of water. On his direction, 60,000 pairs of hands delved into 60,000 specially prepared bags and took out 60,000 small bottles.
In unison, the audience unscrewed the lids and downed the contents.
'Does that taste good, Singapore?' bellowed the commentator. The crowd roared back that it tasted just fine. But this was not just any old water. The assembled throng was drinking Newater, water that has been reclaimed from the city-state's drains and sewers. Put simply, it is purified sewage that has been made as good as new with the application of science.
While some people may not fancy the idea of swallowing something second-hand - colourfully referred to as the 'yuck factor' - Newater represents a major development in Singapore's efforts to promote greater self-sufficiency. And that in turn could have significant repercussions on relations with neighbouring Malaysia, which supplies about 60 per cent of Singapore's daily water needs. Welcome to aqua-politics.
'Newater is enough to replace all the water we are taking from Malaysia under the 1961 agreement,' Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said just before the August 9 celebrations. He was referring to one of two binding deals that the city-state hammered out with Malaysia in the early 1960s for the supply of millions of litres of raw water.