Into the home straight for our 4th year

We received the good news early in the week that the house in Yarra Glen has been sold at the listed price. Actually it never got advertised, our agent already knew someone who was looking for just this sort of home in that location and it has now been signed off. The good thing is Mum also knows them through her networks and she is happy they are keen gardeners. Now just the paperwork to be completed and Mum's financial position to be assessed by Centrelink to complete the process for accepting a place in an Aged Care Facility. 

We resumed work and exercise schedules but the haze lingered for the week so we chose mostly to stay indoors as much as we could. On Thursday we did venture over to Toa Payoh to confirm the route for the walk on Monday with the group. It was a pleasant surprise to discover the Lian Shan Shuang Lin Monastery, Singapore's oldest Buddhist monastery, is one of the sites chosen to display the colourful lanterns for the Mid Autumn Festival, a traditional Chinese festival on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month, which this year falls on Sunday. It was originally an autumn harvest festival celebrated by farmers in ancient China and is now considered a time for reunion and renewal of friendship and kinship as well. It is being widely celebrated here now with multiple sites (not just Chinatown), making it the second-largest Chinese festival here, after the Chinese New Year. These structures are all constructed of silk and the finishing touches were being put to them on Thursday.

On the loop walk we also visited the Sun Yat Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall, also known as Wan Qing Yuan, in Balastier. He was the revolutionary who helped to overthrow the last imperial dynasty of China and is regarded as the founding father of the modern People’s Republic of China. In the early 1900's he spent time in Singapore (then known as Nanyang) raising funds and working for the revolutionary cause and stayed at this beautiful two-storey, colonial-style villa a number of times. It is set in beautiful grounds and opposite a park named after him that opened at the end of 2013. A highlight of the villa's grounds is the 2m tall bronze wall mural which spans 60m along the fence line.  It depicts Singapore's history from the 1840s as a fishing village to the 1940s and the Sook Ching Massacre in 1942, the  "purging of Chinese" by the Japanese after the British colony surrendered. 

Unfortunately the museum and grounds are closed on Mondays so the walking group were unable to see the astonishing wall. Everyone enjoyed the rest of the walk though which wasn't physically challenging but includes a lot of history and cultural icons. There is the Dragon Playground, one of Singapore's most loved landmarks, first built in 1979. It is part of the HDB's series of playground designs with an animal theme. This dragon playground is one of only two remaining playgrounds in Singapore with this design, the other being in Ang Mo Kio. Only the dragon playground in Toa Payoh has retained its sand surface. The Lam Yeo ("Nanyang" in Hokkien) Coffee Powder shop in Balestier road has been in operation since 1959, opened by the current owner's father. Visiting the shop is like stepping back in time as it has not changed much since it was first founded, and the owner feels that there is no need for renovation as long as the place is kept clean. The strong aroma of their signature blends drew much interest from the group and there was a rush on his supply of traditional kopitiam cups and saucers. The unmistakable smell of freshly baked bread was the next sensory experience as we stepped into the Sing Hon Loong old-style bakery in Whampoa, it is one of the few remaining traditional bakeries in Singapore. They produce at least 1,400 loaves of traditional brown and white crustless breads which are then distributed fresh to coffee shops and local minimarts daily. We watched as the loaves were tossed out of their tins then stripped of their crusts before slicing and packaging. 

Balestier Road was named after Joseph Balestier, the first American Consul to Singapore in 1837. He developed a large sugar plantation, which he called Balestier Plain, around what is now known as Toa Payoh Estate. In this part of town the road is home to rows of shophouses (most of which  seem to be devoted to selling light fixtures and other interior decoration items) budget hotels, low-rise apartments and commercial buildings. There are plenty of interesting old buildings worthy of conservation. 

Then there is also the Burmese Buddhist Temple, Maha Sasana Ramsi, the oldest Theravada institution and the only Burmese Buddhist temple of its kind in Singapore. It houses the largest pure white marble statue of the Buddha outside of Myanmar, and has become a religious landmark for Burmese and Singaporean devotees. Like we discovered in Myanmar, the Buddha images have a halo of colourful flashing LED lights. Striking the bell 3 times should bring you luck.  

On Tuesday a number of us met up at Plonk in Serangoon Gardens for an opportunity to share holiday snippets and complain about the continuing haze. It is by far the worst we have experienced here. and it further deteriorated over Wednesday night. As of 1pm on Thursday, the 3-hour PSI was 260, while the 24-hour PSI was 179-219, in the Unhealthy range. These conditions are expected to persist for the rest of the day, and there could be further deterioration in the air quality as the prevailing winds are forecast to blow from the south-southeast or south-southwest. Warnings in the news - Given the air quality forecast for the next 24 hours, healthy people should reduce prolonged or strenuous outdoor physical exertion, said the NEA. The elderly, pregnant women and children should minimise outdoor activity, while those with chronic lung or heart disease should avoid it altogether.   

Unfortunately Thursday is a public holiday for Hari Raya Haji but not many people will be enjoying the outdoors. We had planned to revisit the monastery in the evening to see the lanterns at their best, but we have cancelled and are presently ensconsed in the apartment with the air-con running.