Nassim Road, Singapore

I walked up Orchard Road to its end and turned into Nassim Road. The name Nassim is of a Jewish family who owned a lodge there which they sold, and many of their family migrated to Israel. It is a rarefied street on which I crossed no more than five pedestrians. Occasionally, taxis and other cars sped by and even their whoosh was hushed and the one other rare sound on the street was of tyres softly grinding. Two lovely dogs toddled down with an old man and they were all quiet, even if the dogs were curious. There are embassies—Japanese, Saudi, Philippine, British—and they are forbidding as one expects embassies to be, but the private condominiums and large villas are aloof also; an invisible barrier hangs before them. The public administration of Singapore makes no mistakes and it has not built pedestrian paths on either side of the street for most of its length, probably not by oversight.

The street ends at the entrance to the Botanical Gardens. I went in and was immediately relieved to be amidst joggers and strollers and tourists and schoolchildren. I found a bench and read a little, but mostly, I gazed at the green.

Technorati Tags: singapore, travel