https://www.scmp.com/rss/328033/feed Ken Kwek is a production editor at city desk. As a features writer, his stories on social issues and the arts have appeared in The Straits Times, Esquire Singapore, Monocle magazine and Mekong Review. He is also a filmmaker, playwright and author of children's books. en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com When the November storms unleashed their fury on the Indonesian island of Batam, Dewi Puspalani and her 70-year-old mother-in-law, Mayuteh, scrambled to salvage what they could. The family’s prized possessions – a small refrigerator and a few other appliances – were hoisted onto a table. Her husband stashed away the charcoal grill he used to run their modest food business, while the family’s five children were sent to higher ground to shelter with relatives. Rain hammered down on their two-room... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3298756/toxic-tides-life-indonesias-most-polluted-village?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3298756/toxic-tides-life-indonesias-most-polluted-village?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 15 Feb 2025 00:00:15 +0000 If Sylvia Earle had her way, she’d likely spend the rest of her days beneath the waves, exploring the ocean’s mysteries from the comfort of a submarine. The 89-year-old marine biologist and former chief scientist of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has spent a lifetime championing ocean conservation and exploration. She was among the first people to ever use scuba gear and in 1970, she spent two weeks living underwater at the Tektite II research station with four other... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3286808/singapore-state-art-submersibles-and-sylvia-earles-depth-defying-dream?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3286808/singapore-state-art-submersibles-and-sylvia-earles-depth-defying-dream?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 16 Nov 2024 04:00:09 +0000 Twelve years ago, when Dhaka-born Aarul completed his secondary school education and was about to join the Bangladesh Army, a family friend introduced him to a recruitment agent in Singapore. The agent promised the 18-year-old an administrative job in the city state, and a S$850 (US$602) monthly salary that was 10 times what he would earn as a soldier. Coronavirus fuels record-breaking philanthropy drive in Singapore But there was a catch. Aarul would have to shell out S$8,000 for his flights,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3086751/singapore-ngos-call-rethink-migrant-workers-salaries-health?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3086751/singapore-ngos-call-rethink-migrant-workers-salaries-health?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 31 May 2020 07:00:06 +0000 I live in Singapore’s Holland Village with my wife and nine-year-old son, in a Housing and Development Board (HDB) flat built in 1974. It’s a fairly central neighbourhood, neatly divided into three segments and walkable end-to-end in a leisurely 30 minutes. On one end is Chip Bee Gardens, where a cluster of terraced houses and condominiums are flanked by a row of hipster cafes and bakeries. This is where the professionals and many expats live. Then there is the town centre, with its MRT station,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3082513/singapores-addiction-growth-built-backs-migrant-workers?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3082513/singapores-addiction-growth-built-backs-migrant-workers?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 02 May 2020 02:45:08 +0000 Sean Ghazi is an actor, dancer and singer. Following a successful stint on London’s West End, Ghazi returned to his native Malaysia and has appeared in musicals in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore including P Ramlee The Musical (Enfiniti Vision Media), La Cage Aux Follies (Wild Rice) and Urinetown: The Musical (Pangdemonium). He runs Baby Grand Productions, a small production company, and is also the artistic director of the live entertainment venue Bobo KL. Alfian Sa’at is a poet, essayist and... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3080441/what-lockdown-life-singapore-poet-alfian-saat-and?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3080441/what-lockdown-life-singapore-poet-alfian-saat-and?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 19 Apr 2020 06:00:11 +0000 Kegan Venard’s life has been upended in more ways than one. Over the past eight years, the 31-year-old overcame the vagaries of freelance work to establish himself as a regular lighting technician in Singapore’s flourishing theatre scene. On Valentine’s Day, he proposed to his girlfriend, a single mother with two young daughters, and they were set to wed in October. What lockdown life is life for Singapore poet Alfian Sa'at and Malaysia performer Sean Ghazi Then the Covid-19 situation escalated... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3080396/coronavirus-singapore-malaysia-arts-workers-left?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/lifestyle-culture/article/3080396/coronavirus-singapore-malaysia-arts-workers-left?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 19 Apr 2020 05:00:16 +0000 The history of Singapore cinema has been rewritten by two films from two eras going by the same title: Shirkers. The tumultuous and abortive production of the first film, a surrealist fiction written by Sandi Tan and shot in 1992, is chronicled defiantly in the second, a documentary which earned Tan a Best Director award at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. But before the success of its second manifestation, the original Shirkers was born out of the efforts of three pioneering film... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/2171592/shirkers-no-more-three-trailblazing-women-stake-their-claim?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/2171592/shirkers-no-more-three-trailblazing-women-stake-their-claim?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 04 Nov 2018 08:15:15 +0000 Singapore is at the tail end of yet another vociferous public debate about Section 377A, the law that criminalises acts of “gross indecency” between consenting male adults. But unlike Hong Kong and Taiwan, which have made strides towards recognising same-sex couples, authorities in the Lion City appear reluctant to strike down the law, leaving gay men at risk of prosecution and the LGBTI community vulnerable to renewed prejudice. In the weeks since homosexuality was decriminalised in India on... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2168760/gay-sex-debate-helped-hong-kong-singapore-it-made-things-worse?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2168760/gay-sex-debate-helped-hong-kong-singapore-it-made-things-worse?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 17 Oct 2018 02:00:00 +0000 When a Hong Kong athlete went public with claims her coach had sexually abused her when she was a teenager, her case prompted a flood of support from the public and fellow athletes, praise from sports officials for her bravery, and an intervention by the city’s chief executive, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, to ensure swift police action. Yet when a Singapore hurdler emboldened by the athlete’s example and the #MeToo movement spoke out in similar fashion this year, she found herself labelled an... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/2167134/tale-two-metoos-hong-kong-and-singapore-athletics?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/2167134/tale-two-metoos-hong-kong-and-singapore-athletics?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 06 Oct 2018 00:00:45 +0000 The centrepiece of this year’s recently concluded Singapore Theatre Festival is a play about the newsroom. It’s entitled The Press Gang, written by an old hand of both theatre and journalism, Tan Tarn How. Mr Tan is a rigorous intellectual and a fiery dramatist, and Press Gang is his eighth full-length play in a long career that includes a successful Hong Kong production, The First Emperor’s Last Days, staged by the Chung Ying Theatre Company in 1998. Much has been said in other reviews about... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2156462/tan-tarn-hows-press-gang-speaks-unprintable-truth-about?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2156462/tan-tarn-hows-press-gang-speaks-unprintable-truth-about?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 23 Jul 2018 08:30:00 +0000