That, was barely seven months ago. To me, the number seven is Divine because on the seventh day, God rested.

Even if Orchard Road wasn’t flooded today, I am quite sure those along Bukit Timah Road would beg to differ. If I am not wrong, floods occurred regularly along parts of Bukit Timah Road whenever there’s heavy rain. Just last year, floods also affected areas like Thomson near MacRitchie Reservoir together with parts of Bukit Timah Road.

This morning, while I was shivering in the cold air-conditioned room in the office, I received a call from a friend who just drove past Keppel Road informing me that the car park of the old KTM station at Tanjong Pagar, the leftmost lane of Keppel Road, and parts of Cantonment Link were all flooded at least up to knee depth. He mentioned that the splash around his car reminded him of the days when we took our armoured vehicles out for flotation exercises during National Service.

It is ironical that my mother used to tell me that floods have more or less ceased to exist ‘ever since Lao Lee became Prime Minister’. While my mother’s memory may have been in error, for it to occur today in Orchard Road really takes the cake. I wonder what the tourists in Marriot Hotel and the other hotels along Scotts Road would be thinking when they looked out of their hotel rooms at waters below. To me, it’s a great loss of national prestige. After all, being the 9th most expensive city in Asia with some of the best paid civil servants serpents in the world, I expect the infrastructure built to be able to cater to this and would have preferred that floods (no matter how fleeting) remain nothing but stories my parents’ generation will be telling to their grandchildren. However, I guess it would be rather difficult for the government gahmen to do anything to increase the capacity of the Stamford Canal, as I noticed that much of it is now concealed with only very small stretches (next to car park opposite Centrepoint and along Handy Road) exposed to the surface.

Even so, it has been a really long time since I heard about a flood at the junction of Patterson Road, Scotts Road and Orchard Road. That was at least 15 to 20 years ago, and it wasn’t even a real event. It was a joke in a track in Kopikat Klan’s “Why you so like that?” cassette which suggests to me that floods must have regularly occurred in that area during that time.

Whatever the case is, I have never imagined that this will happen. For as long as I can remember that little park on top of Orchard MRT Station, there has never been a flood at that very junction (or along Orchard Road). For those who can still remember, that little park used to be a favorite hangout for Filipino maids during weekends before Ion Orchard was built. Is it sheer coincidence that not long after that area is developed into yet another soulless monument to consumerism, that junction is hit by a flood?

Anyway, not long ago a report on the performance of town councils (which I considered to have a political agenda) was released to shame the opposition parties. I was told by a friend that Orchard Road falls under the Tanjong Pagar town council – listed in that very same report as best and number lampar 1 town council. While ensuring that the drains are not clogged and the general cleanliness of Orchard Road probably have nothing to do with the town council itself, it is divine poetic justice if it is true Orchard Road is within the area under the Tanjong Pagar Town Council. I can’t help but chuckled when I think of it.

Anyway, here are the pictures loaded to Twitter by some of the netizens. Take a look at Orchard Road Sungei Orchard, Singapore’s very own Huang He (黄河, i.e. Yellow River).

Recommended Reads:
nadnut: My 5 favourite Blackberry Apps