This blog post is part of the Random Sampling Singapore project. The Project aims to sample 100 places on the island of Singapore over a one year period in order to gain an unbiased and holistic view of the city state.

On the 21st August we went with Anthony Nguyen to look for coordinate #32. Anthony is a Cyber Security Specialist from Canada, who is living and working in Singapore.

The coordinate he chose was at Pandan Loop in a light industrial area in Clementi between two industrial buildings, behind a security guard house near the entrance.

In the Security guardhouse was nobody. This was not because it was weekend, but the whole area and building was abandoned.

On top of the building the logo was still readable through the remaining stain around the removed letters.

As soon as I turned around to Anthony he already googled the Japanese companies name. He found out that the company was making artificial flavors and perfume. What a coincidence that in Pandan Loop where as far as we could see no Pandan plant was growing, artificial flavors were produced. Pandan is one of the signature flavors of south-east Asia.

We could reach the point up to meters behind a fence, sampling the front gate of the abandoned property.

Sampling

Anthony sampled a man-made white rock, with polished surface, as well a red fleshy seed and a RJ-45 network plug..

In the lab I looked at the items closer. The seed is from a Tembusu tree (Fagraea fragrans or in Chinese: 香灰莉木) . Once more the name of the tree, which is printed on the Singapore 5 dollar note, have something to do with fragrances.

The samples Anthony chose was a polished stone, a network plug and a seed from the Tempusu tree.

Artwork

In Progress