A Hello and Goodbye Place
November 7th, 2005 | Published in general | 12 Comments
We’ve all got our Hello and Goodbye Places. Places like that encircle the periphery of your heart, mark out its defences, and watch its gates. Places that, through no effort of yours, establishes landmarks and demolishes old structures.
One of the ways I can get to school is to hop on a 106 ââ¬â but I don’t find myself doing that very often. The recent construction taking place around Holland Village, a sight which 106 passes through, breaks my heart. All that noise and all that eyesore: for what? To build a bloody MRT station. One which will connect to SMU, no less.
Part of the charm of the place, for those of us who call it our second home, is how easy it is for us to get there, and how difficult it is for everyone else. In all honesty there isn’t very much in Holland Village. It’s simply a collection of buildings which, together, make up an entity we have come to love, and come to love in. I secretly think we all love it for having held out against a McDonalds, and instead having 2 Crystal Jades, a Burger King and a Subway. “Town” may be relative: Jurong for those far out west, Siglap for others. But none of these connect to central Singapore in a straight road and under 15 minutes, as well as to our houses in the same time. And on its periphery, fish soup with XO, upmarket Italian restaurants and bars without the yuppie pretentions of its in-town equivalents.
Holland Village is midnight Chinese suppers and freshly baked bread in the mornings. Brilliant cakes from quirky little Japanese-owned cafes and beers on a rooftop. In Hello and Goodbye places, you keep returning to the same place again and again to date, to fall in love, to fall out of it; to celebrate anniversaries, to quietly think about the people you still miss.
Insiders know it better than a cartographer, a food and drink directory and a transportation guide put together. You can recite: Cho Lon, Bunalan, Da Paolo Gastronomia, Original Sin, Michaelango’s, Sistina, Au Petit Salut, Da Paolo, on its more moneyed side. One always tells a newcomer apart by how they direct their taxis into awkward corners, confused by the construction, while we know what time the barrier comes down so taxis can’t enter, the different times the har gow at Crystal Jade runs out on different days.
You tear down its exterior but its inner secrets remain ââ¬â on the very same spot, it was Hello at Gloria Jean’s and Hello, Goodbye when Gloria Jean’s became Spizza. Goodbye, Breko. Hello, playground behind Wala’s. Holland Village on a weekend is like going through a little black book, spying your ex-es with their new lovers. It is always Holland Village after every breakup, being comforted by ex-lovers, each having their go at telling me how idiotic I am and how the new girl is another bad idea of mine. It is a culmination of my idiocy, pain and joy. You can’t not love a place that does this for you.
Now it will never be the same, with ‘development’ at its door and debris in the midst of it. Perhaps in its wake I go traipsing off to places like Arab Street and Little India, seeking new idols not entirely untainted by the old.
November 7th, 2005 at 8:10 am (#)
so bittersweet.
November 7th, 2005 at 8:56 am (#)
Sigh…spot on…Holland will never be the same. Why would you need an MRT there?! That’s part of what makes it so special.
But things change for better or worst. I remembered my grandma taking me to an outdoor movie at Holland V. Where wooden stools and seats filled the walkways outside Katong Laksa and pet station and everyone in the neighbourhood will just gather on a “cool” evening to watch cheesy old-school movies.
A mesmerising and nostalgic place for many, with different meanings, stories and memories……sad
November 7th, 2005 at 1:17 pm (#)
I didn’t know you lived near Holland V (which is very near me as well. lol)
It is a great place, with a really unique character. Just walking through the sloping, crooked pathways is a pleasure. To the consternation of my family, I refuse to cut my hair at anywhere else but its Hair Talk Salon. Great stylists, too bad Kelvin left.
November 7th, 2005 at 4:16 pm (#)
I feel just the same way about Holland V. Maybe that’s why I try not to go there anymore…
November 7th, 2005 at 11:55 pm (#)
Holland breaks my heart. But I love it anyway.
November 8th, 2005 at 1:19 am (#)
Great writing.
November 8th, 2005 at 2:15 am (#)
echo. great writing. :)
au Petit Salut, now where might that be? Sounds french, do they serve good cheese?
the bread store (japanese?) opposite Subway is simply brilliant.
November 8th, 2005 at 5:09 am (#)
ashwin: au petit salut is the french restaurant right next to sistina (which is in turn right next to michaelangos). they’re on jalan merah saga, across the road from the cold storage/starbucks side of holland v. covered by construction.. so you gotta find your way in.
i haven’t tried au petit salut since they changed chefs. apparently the food is much better now. they do a set lunch at $28++ which i hear is pretty good.
provence bakery was what i meant by “freshly baked bread”. hehe.
November 8th, 2005 at 2:19 pm (#)
Heh…said goodbye at Au Petit Salut once…haven’t been able to go back since. >sob
November 8th, 2005 at 8:12 pm (#)
it’s really depressing to find out fr your blog (in India), that my holland v back home is being destroyed. My sweet teenage years w my 1st gf n later my early twenties my last gf, were all in HV. It’s very painful to me, my memories in sg, are slowly being tore away, piece by piece. I just hope new HV retain its taste. MRT is stupid, a very good way to get it “baboom” (cannot insert that word. Coming back from India, everything new! sIGH!!!!!
November 19th, 2005 at 11:36 am (#)
I do that ex thing literally, cos my ex does live there sulks and I happen to live close by as well, double sulks
But I love HV for what it is and always will be
June 12th, 2006 at 5:02 pm (#)
hey there, Holland Village has always been an integral part of my teenage years and beyond. It still is today…from my national service days, to NUS years and my working life thus far.
Living in Chip Bee Gardens in the late 90s with friends while still in NUS, walking the dogs in the Village, doing late night suppers, grocery shopping in Cold Storage at 1am on a weekend night (a newly instituted initiative), etc; it’s a very Village thing to do i say.
and yeah…doing the ex thingy there after a break up; where friends will come rallying around you at Coffee Club up in the verandah (or balcony if you like it); trust me - i do that too!
after more than 2 years of living right behind Orchard Road, i made the decision to move back to the Village…mebbe it’s for old time’s sake i guess. and gosh, i’m glad to be back here again, a min walk to the familiar post office and POSB, 2 mins walk to Cold Storage, a 10 mins straight bus ride to town…i cld not ask for more.
bittersweet.