Paying The Price

It was around the middle of July, at the start of the one week mid-term vacation, that I last went to see my back doc. He's moved his premises to a spot around the Serangoon Road area, just across from the Mustapha Centre. After the appointment the Missus and I went for a cuppa just outside the centre. It felt good to be amongst the crowd again with the shops in the area beginning to pick-up business after the lockdown - this being some seven weeks after schools had opened again.

The signs then were good, since it didn't look like too many places had needed to close down. So it was saddening today to read of the lay-offs at the Mustapha Centre itself. Most of all, the lay-offs of their staff from overseas who'll have their work passes rescinded, I assume, and have to go back to their countries. I'm guessing it won't be easy for them, to put it mildly, though the resilience of folks struggling at the bottom of the ladder can be astonishing.

I know of quite a few people who've not found themselves terribly troubled by the unusual circumstances we've all found ourselves in this year. Indeed, I'd count myself as one of them - with a very keen awareness of the luck involved in that. But it's deeply worrying to consider the likelihood that such people are a minority and others have been paying, and may well come to pay, a devastating price as a result of those circumstances.