In 2002, Singapore was a thriving Southeast Asian nation known for its economic success and efficient government. After gaining independence from Britain in the late 1950s, Singapore had quickly become one of the most prosperous countries in the region.
The country’s economy was highly diversified, with a focus on manufacturing and services such as banking and finance. Singapore also had an extensive transportation network that included ports, airports, highways and rail links. This allowed goods to move quickly throughout the city-state and beyond.
The government of Singapore was committed to providing its citizens with quality education and healthcare. Education was free and compulsory for all children aged 6-15, while the healthcare system provided universal coverage for everyone regardless of income or social status.
According to computerannals, Singapore also had a strong international presence due to its strategic location at the crossroads between East Asia and South Asia. This enabled it to benefit from both regional trade networks as well as global markets. In 2002, Singapore was seen by many as an example of what could be achieved through sound economic policies and effective governance.
Yearbook 2002
Singapore. After the terrorist attacks against the United States in 2001, Singapore gave its support to the global campaign against terrorism. In early 2002, the government announced that 15 militant Muslims, 14 of whom were Singaporean citizens, had been arrested in accordance with the country’s strict security laws. They were arrested on suspicion of planned terrorist activity against Western interests in Singapore.
According to Countryaah website, national day of Singapore is every August 9. Several of the arrested were reported to belong to the Southeast Asian militant organization Jemaa Islamiyya, believed to form the terror network of al-Qa’ida’s branch in the area. Several similar arrangements were made during the year, including: in August when 21 suspected Singaporean members of Jemaa Islamiyya were arrested.
Irritation also arose among Muslims when some girls were suspended from school for wearing a veil and thus breaking the school uniform rules. The parents of the four girls decided in April to sue the country’s government, which is unusual in Singapore. To his aid, they had the same Malaysian top lawyer, Karpal Singh, who defended the former Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister of Malaysia, Anwar Ibrahim, in the heavily criticized trials against him. The lawyer was later banned from operating in Singapore.
Singapore Country Overview
Visas
Finnish citizens do not need a visa to travel to Singapore for less than 90 days. The passport must be valid for at least 6 months after the trip.According to ABBREVIATIONFINDER.ORG, SGP stands for Singapore.
Insurance
Everyone participating in the trip must have a valid travel insurance that covers medical expenses in the event of illness or other similar need. Please check the validity of your own insurance and the terms and conditions of the insurance cancellation cover.
Please pay attention to the special nature of your trip and check the coverage of the insurance in that respect as well. In many locations, the insurance must also be valid when moving at an altitude of more than 3,000 meters, in which case it also covers mountain sickness.
Many hiking or diving trips require more extensive insurance, which covers, for example, diving or moving on a glacier. Please check the contents of your insurance with your insurance company.
Recommended vaccinations In
addition to the basic vaccinations (tetanus, diphtheria and polio), hepatitis A and B vaccinations are recommended for the trip. Based on a risk assessment is also worth considering Typhoid and Japanese aivotulehdus- rokotteita.Tarkistathan always vaccination requirements, local health clinic or travel vaccination advice
Currency: Singapore Dollar (SGD). Currency can be obtained from Finland by booking in advance.
Time difference
GMT +8, ie 6 hours ahead of Finnish time
Electricity
230V, 50 Hz
Mobile phones
Check coverage with your operator.
Architecture. – After the expulsion from the Malaysian Federation (1965) Singapore, from an infamous stopover on the route to China, has been able to transform itself into a symbol of efficiency and order. Its economic, cultural and construction liveliness has found new territories by reclaiming the areas of the sea strait that connect the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean, with the consequent current alteration of the geography of the island which in the last fifty years has seen its already modest roughness to transfer the land of the demolished hills to the coast.
If vertical growth was an almost obligatory choice for urban development, given the smallness of the territory, on the contrary the spectacular architecture, with a futuristic vocation, represented a considered decision – with economic, political and social implications -, a vision on which massive urban renewal and rapid modernization of the city-state were founded.
One of the most important and iconic projects carried out in recent years is the Marina bay sands (2011, Moshe Safdie) which consists of the aggregation, on the homonymous bay, of three 55-storey skyscrapers (with a convention center, a hotel and commercial spaces) that suspend a panoramic swimming pool at a height of 200 m. By the same Israeli architect also the Artscience Museum (2011) which is inspired by a lotus flower whose petals contain exhibition spaces.
Among the projects that have contributed to increasing Singapore’s fame as a place of architectural experimentation – a collage of imaginative imported technologies and local cultural instances – stand out: the National Library (2005) by Malaysian Ken Yeang, who has always been committed to sustainable projects; the Helix Bridge (2010, Cox Rayner Architects with Arup and Architects 61), a double-helix pedestrian bridge in glass and steel, which connects the central part of the bay with the southern one; Reflections at Keppel Bay (2011, Studio Libeskind), a complex of residential towers with a curved profile and sharp tops; the Singapore School of the arts (2011, WOHA) which combines spaces for education and exhibition areas; the One Raffles place tower 2 (2012) one of the most representative skyscrapers in the business district built by SAA Architects, important local studio that since the seventies has contributed to redesigning the face of the city. Finally, the Singapore life church (2013, LAUD Architects), a singular building covered with an interactive skin that replaces a previous modernist volume.
Also of note is the Public art project, an intervention that proposes the setting up, in the nerve centers of the city, of the works of well-known local and international sculptors; an ideal artistic walk that testifies to the interest of the Singapore administration in attracting cultural tourism. Transforming Singapore into a vibrant place of the arts is indeed a clear objective of the municipal administration: proof of this is the establishment of the Singapore Biennale (since 2006) and the proposal to host the seventh World architecture festival in Singapore (2014).
The cult of modernity and the intent to amaze have now canceled the colonial character of Singapore, but, at the same time, they have enhanced and built, with planned intentionality, the image of a city still immersed in a tropical garden. Alongside the historic Botanic Gardens, on the waterfront of the city, there is a project that declines the theme of the garden in a contemporary key. In an area of 101 ha, a monumental intervention on the scale of the landscape was designed. The complex consists of Gardens by the bay (2011, Wilkinson Eyre Architects and Grant Associates), a lush garden in which 162,000 plants grow among 18 ferrous structures that abstract the image of the tree (supertrees) and hide a device for the production of renewable energy, and two gigantic greenhouses, Flower done and Cloud forest, inside which the Mediterranean and tropical climatic conditions have been reproduced.
