The memoir of the former Secretary General of the Chinese Communist Party, Zhao Ziyang, will be released.

Titled Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang the memoir is compiled from tapes and notes Zhao left.

The memoir was touted by many as offering a rare insight into the workings of the Chinese leadership and politics.

Article from UK’s The Times

Article from the New York Times

Nostalgia has been seen as more than a rose-tinted view of the past. A sense of nostalgia has also been interpreted as a critique of the present.

Whether it’s a longing for the good old bad days of the kampung life, with its questionable hygiene and poverty, or for the food of yesterday  – nevermind the fact that such dishes were borne out of poverty and the lack of abundance – nostalgia is chic.

Even Mao is now the subject of nostagla among many Chinese – Tough times breed nostalgia for Mao

Charing Cross is one of London’s most famous areas, renown for its books. It’s a must visit for book lovers. As with many other cities in the world, because of development, Charing Cross today is no longer the Charing Cross of yore.

It is untenable and impractical to want to maintain the past as it is, whatever it may be. It is virtually impossible. As historian Paul Cohen argues in History in Three Keys, no matter how exact we may be able to reconstruct the past, we will never be able to reconstruct and replicate the spirit and the experience of that bygone era.

There has been many efforts to “preserve” the past, as it were. And here is an interesting interactive guide to the historic Charing Cross area. Not the most ideal, but it’s better than letting the history slip into the unknown.

I received an email from my cousin a few days ago, with the subject title “Singapore in the sixties”.

“Things just ain’t what they used to be” was how the email started. Embedded in the email are a few pictures of Singapore, well, in the 1960s. There were some aerial shots of the Beach Road and Raffles Place areas, the waterfront – Singapore River, Esplanade, Chinatown, National Library (the red brick building on Stamford Road), the Van Kleef Aquarium and the Tiger Balm Garden etc etc. Each picture had captions of personal takes on the “then and now”.

As I get older, I get more and more emails like these or come across writings and musings about the past, those “good old days”. At times, I even find myself lamenting about those “good old days”.

On deeper reflections, are the “good old days” really that good? We brushed aside the poverty in favour of simplicity, we forget the hardships of making a living or unhygienic conditions in favour of the authenticity of the times.

Why do we so often see the past through such rose-tinted lens?

Perhaps it’s because we can’t quite cope with the present?

When I first watched Eng Yee Peng’s Diminishing Memories last year, I questioned the practicality of her wish to hold on to the past.

While I miss certain aspects of the past, I understood the need to move on. I thought.

But now, I think I can understand how Yee Peng feels. Recently, I felt the sudden onslaught of a feeling I could not quite put my finger on, until I chatted with Yee Peng and Stephanie. It was trauma. The trauma of having lost one’s past.

When we talk of trauma, our thoughts would usually go straight to conflict situations, such as wars, the Holocaust, major conflicts that suddenly upset the rhythm of life. Everyday life.

But what about the trauma of development? Walking in the midst of crowds the other day at Raffles Place, I suddenly felt the real meaning of being swept away, of being overwhelmed, of being helpless. There was no way out, except to follow the crowd.

In the place of one of my childhood homes stands pillars that support the MRT track between Aljunied and Kallang. Another has turned into a eating place amidst karaoke bars and massage parlours. They have become unrecognisable. Nooks and cranies where I used to play hide-and-seek with my cousins have turned into smokers’ corners or places where hookers, well, seek to hook.

Every time I come back to Singapore, things change, places change. Some dramatic, others not so.

The library I used to hang out at after work has now become a tunnel. My old school has grown into a monstrosity with additional buildings and security sheds that it is no longer recognisable. New buildings have gone up and new roads opened right around the place I used to work at just three years ago.

My landmarks of the city have all been altered, altered drastically. If that is not trauma, I don’t know what that is.

Has our hearts and heads caught up with the rapid pace of development? I don’t think so.

Is it time to let go?  I don’t know.