Throw
back to the 40s, 50s, or even early 60s, there were probably a million people
here, or lesser in the 40s. Many were stateless, new migrants allowed to work
but no citizenship status. They just fended for themselves under the colonial
administration that would be very happy as long as there was no problem from
the population of migrants. The migrants knew their station in life and kept to
themselves, away from the law, and just worked and lived.
The
long arm of the law was thin and short. Land was aplenty, state land, neglected
land or untended land everywhere, officially owned by the colonial Govt. The
migrants came and looked for a place to stay. Many were herded into the
cubicles of Chinatown for the Chinese while the Indians
would have their own appointed corner in the island. I was at Thian Hock Keng a
couple of days ago and could not imagine that some 80 years ago my parents were
standing in front of ‘Ma Cho’ praying at the very same spot that I stood before
settling down in this island.
They
were not so fortunate but braved the uncertainties and unknown, moved to the
foothill of Mount Faber where a Malay kampong
Radin Mas stood. At the fringes of the kampong they simply erected a hut from
whatever wood available and there was instant home. Many migrants did just
that, built themselves a home on any vacant land they could find, away from the
kampongs or towns. And there were plenty of land all over the island. After
sometimes they would become owner or official tenants of their huts. The ‘teh
gus’ would come to register their huts and a official address was given, and
that was it. It was like finder’s keepers. I think in the early days there was
a law that said once a person occupied a land, built his hut, and lived there after
some years, then the land became his, or something like that. It was like
choped choped, but not with tissue papers.
And
this was not too long ago. The early years of colonial Singapore when the island was too
large to administer and too few people to fill up the vacant land. Land was not
scarce like today. It is all relativism. Try imagine 2030. Everything will be
scarce except people in this island.