Since the festival of Diwali just finished, here’s a throwback to the Diwali Bazaar in Little India from a couple of years back!
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Tag Archives: Singapore
In My Hands Today…
Olivia & Sophia – Rosie Milne
When Raffles sets sail from the cold, damp confines of Georgian London to make his name and fortune in the tropics, he takes with him his new wife, Olivia, a raffish beauty with a scandalous past. She infatuates both his closest friend, a poet and one of his bitterest rivals, a soldier. Raffles sees what is going on, but he turns a blind eye – or so hopes Olivia.
After Olivia’s death, and back on leave in London, Raffles, a man once again in need of a wife, makes a practical marriage. Sophia, no beauty, but curious and intelligent, embraces the opportunity of an exciting life abroad. Marriage brings her great joy but also great sadness. Her life with Raffles becomes a catalogue of loss: of their children, of their possessions, of their savings.
And all the while, Raffles, driven and talented, manoeuvres at the centre of global networks of power, trade, politics and diplomacy. His scheming culminates, to his eventual glory, with the founding of a new trading post: Singapore.
In My Hands Today…
City of Small Blessings – Simon Tay
A Singaporean retires, migrates and then returns. But, he slowly finds, there is no simple return to the place called home. Once a well-known public figure who contributed to the country, he is now outside the rush of workdays, on the fringe of the city he barely recognises, distanced from his wife and son, even as he loves them. A letter comes from the government and he begins the journey. In the present, he must find a way to face the new men of authority. In the past, he must confront old sacrifices and struggles. He regrets. He loves. He cycles and discovers…
In My Hands Today…
The Trader’s Wife – Anna Jacobs
Singapore in the 1860s is exotic and yet terrifying for a penniless Englishwoman, alone and vulnerable after her mother’s death. Too pretty to obtain a governess’s job, Isabella Saunders accepts an offer from a Singapore merchant to teach him English and live with his family.
Two years later Bram Deagan arrives in Singapore, determined to make his fortune as a trader. Mr Lee sees a way to expand his business connections and persuades Isabella to marry Bram.
Bravely, she sets sail for a new land and life. But the past casts a long shadow and together they face unexpected dangers. Will they find a way to achieve their dreams of a successful trading business?
In My Hands Today…
A Different Sky – Meira Chand
Singapore, 1927. Three young people are starting to question whether this in between island can ever truly be their home.
Mei Lan comes from a famous Chinese dynasty but yearns to free herself from its stifling traditions. Ten-year-old Howard seethes at the indignities heaped on his fellow Eurasians by the colonial British. Raj, fresh off the boat from India, wants only to work hard and become a successful businessman.
As the years pass, and the Second World War sweeps through the east, with the Japanese occupying Singapore, the three are thrown together in unexpected ways, and tested to breaking point.
Memories and Such 