The Shock Of The New

 

 

 

Just back from taking the troops (three nieces this time) to the Gardens on the Bay, the latest tourist attraction of this small nation. Well, I think it's the latest. Actually it's now been around a while, at least a year, a long time in this Far Place, and seemingly everyone else has been there except us. So we put that right today, in a rather jolly manner involving lots of giggling and snapping and general silliness.

But here's the thing. As good as the gardens were, especially the two beautifully designed air-conditioned pavilions, they were just so new, so just-arrived. And just returning as we have from somewhere so old, so long-remembered, the contrast was jarring. Much as I enjoyed almost everything I saw, and much as I enjoyed snapping away typically indiscriminately, I had a curious sense that this was all somehow a replacement for something more real; a sense that the whole location was an exercise in a kind of loving ersatz.

These are jaundiced words, I know. But the feeling is genuine. Which is odd: how can you have a genuine sense of the ersatz? In what sense can any human construction be authentic?