Swing Singapore

On Saturday 27th August 1988, Singapore held its first street dance party called Swing Singapore. The whole stretch of Orchard Road was condoned off for the party and an estimated around 10,000 or more people turned up for the party!

I was in the Army then and since it was a Saturday, I got to book out of camp and I decided that I should to go to the so called party of the year! Upon reaching home, I quickly rang up a few good friends and like all other youngsters we all decided to go and paint the town red!

The road was already jammed packed with all kind of people, both locals and foreigners, by the time we arrived and everyone was dancing and jiving to the ear deafening disco music. As usual, there were many newspaper photographers stationed along the road to capture the moment. Whenever we saw photographers, be it newspaper photographers or hobbyist photographers, my friends and I would wave our hands in the air and cheers at the top of voice to attract their attentions and hoping they would capture us in high spirits.

On the following Sunday, I went to Rex Cinema with my good friend Shaun to catch a movie and we saw a “Mama” (uncle in Tamil) store selling Swing Singapore newspapers. My friend wanted to get a copy so we went up to the uncle to purchase a copy. As the uncle was handling over the newspaper to my friend, he told my friend the guy on the cover page looks like me!

Both of us quickly take a closer look and realised that we were both captured by one of the Swing Singapore newspaper photographer! My good friend was very angry because he was facing away from the camera and we could only see his out-stretched hand (showing a peace sign) and the back of his head.

How times fly? My so called first newspaper debut was 20 years ago! The copy of paper is all crumpled and had turned yellowish by now. Likewise, my jet black hairs had turned grey-ish too! The only consolation is I still have my hair whereas my best friend Shaun's thick and wavy hair is completely gone by now! I know my buddy will definitely kill me when he read this blog! Sorry bro!