Walk through Singapore a generation ago

Posted by noelbynature under Exhibitions, Museums/Heritage Galleries
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If you could turn the clock back 50 years, would you be able to recognise Singapore in the 1960s? The latest exhibition at the National Museum of Singapore, Singapore 1960, offers you a chance to do just that. Jerome was at the museum recently to see the exhibition, and was brought back to his childhood days!

Jerome writes:

It was a trip back in time for me as well, as I browsed through the exhibits. Some were familiar to me, transporting me back to the Singapore of my childhood, to a Singapore that was a very different place from the one we know of today. There were many reminders of the era, as well as the place, in which I had spent my early years in. One such reminder was in the form of a cigarette tin. I remember tins such as the one on display particularly well. This was from being sent regularly to the provision shop to buy a couple of sticks of cigarettes by my father. Cigarettes could then be purchased individually over the counter and this would be taken out of a tin. At that time, my father was trying then to curb his smoking habit and decided not to have a packet at his disposal at home, and so I would invariably be sent to the shops below whenever he felt like a cigarette (something that was possible then as there were no restrictions on minors buying cigarettes, and something I never enjoyed doing) to buy two sticks at a time.

I think it’s safe to say that the legislation preventing the sale of cigarettes to minors is a good thing today! Read the rest of Jerome’s post here. Singapore 1960 is on at the National Museum of Singapore until August 22, which is a little less than two months away - so don’t miss this chance to step back in time and see life in Singapore as it was a generation ago.

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