Love in a time of Dengue Haemorragic Fever

Oisin attends the Green Drinks talk
on Dengue Heamorragic Fever as the Youngest. Particpant. Ever.
Other people are Lianne one of my oldest pals,
and Han Chong from the Nature Society of Singapore

So i was thinking that my life would make a really great film. Honestly it would. It has everything. EVERYTHING. I told my sister before i left at the airport, i would really like it if i now lived the rest of my life without drama. She told me, i don't think this is possible. You are all about the drama.

Actually it is not about my drama, it is about OTHER PEOPLE'S drama. Somehow people who like drama are drawn to me. I do not know why this is.

That said, this holiday was very drama free. It was filled with lots of lunches with friends, chats, talks, reconnections and recognising how incredible and lucky i am, despite the drama. I did have drama visit me for a few days, but i did not rise to drama's bait.

I am now about a stone heavier, as usual, and will spend the rest of the year working it off. It is impossible to put weight on as a teacher. I spend all morning on my feet and then all afternoon doing stuff to get ready for the all morning sessions. I LOVE IT. I have the greatest and best job in the world, i do not care what other people think about their jobs. My jobs is the greatest and best and i could not ask for more.

It has actually kept me anchored and sane and i have grown so much from it. I have learnt so much.

I was talking to Oisin and he has become such a wonderful companion. So funny and sweet and patient and ... well anyway i was telling him about how when you have been through a hard time ad you survive you look back on those times with even more fondness and appreciation than the time you had that were trouble free. You see them as defining you. For instance i remember the times i slept in weird places when i interrailed, not the safe lovely places. Difficult times help to also make us Oisin.

I must tell myself that when i am going through hell.

So Singapore. Honestly it has become completely weird. I could not have predicted how silly it has come. BUT in between the cracks, there is a thriving, exciting and dedicated environmetalist movement stacked to the gills with amazing, smart and wonderful people. People who are rediscovering the little biodiversity left of Singapore and looking after it as best they can.

There are my incredible friends who work on, fighting the good fight despite everything they are told. Shaping and carving a Singapore that THEY want to see and having the ability to do this - their resilience and articulation and resourcefulnes are actually a testimony to how well Singapore has done. If the Singaporean government has any sense AT ALL they would listen carefully to what these patient, good-hearted and generous people have to say and take it very seriously.

Then there is what Singapore can offer the world.

I said to a friend, in all of civilisation no one has been able to crack the code. The code is this: how do you acheive spectacular culture and wealth and increase standards of living so dramatically without then going to a terrible decline after three, if not four generations. If Singapore could crack this code - whose basis is the wise and sustainable use of resources and equity amongst citizens - then it would have given a great gift to the world. Instead of the self-serving, economic zero sum game it is currently indulging in, think bigger. Think all of civilisation and all of space and time and think - this is what we are going to do.

Would that not be wonderful. And it is partly there. High density housing, water recycling....oh gotta go now the boys are awake!