A Personal Guide to Singapore History Part 4 (2015-2020)

By Kenneth Kee

This book describes to A Personal Guide to Singapore History Part 4
(2015 --2020)

Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island city-state in Southeast Asia.

Singapore is one of the only three surviving city-states in the world.

The other two are Monaco and Vatican City.

Singapore is made up of 63 islands, including the main island, which is known as Singapore Island to most people, but is also known as Pulau Ujong.

There are two man-made connections to Johor, Malaysia: the Johor–Singapore Causeway in the north, and the Tuas Second Link in the west.

Jurong Island, Pulau Tekong, Pulau Ubin and Sentosa are the largest of Singapore's smaller islands.

I have written 3 books detailing my personal history of Singapore since 1959.

In this 4th book of Singapore History from 2015 to 2021, the most important event is the death of the most famous person in Singapore Mr Lee Kuan Yew, our first former Prime Minister of Singapore who brought Singapore into the First world from a third world nation, at the age of 91 on 5 February 2015.

Per capita GNP has risen from US$920 in 1965 to US$23,300 in 2000.

The literacy rate of total population has risen from 72% in 1970 to over 97%.

78.7% of the Singapore citizens are housed in cheap public housing flats making them house owners.

17% of the population, or one in every six people, has assets worth $1 million or more, which is the highest in the world.

Both the IMF and the World Bank have placed Singapore at the 3rd position in their GDP per capita list.

The death of Lee Kuan Yew led to an outpouring of grief from the majority of Singaporeans, young and old.

Many of the young people did not know how much that he has done for the country until they were shown television footage of what he has done for his country and how many leaders of the world respected him and asked for his advice.
A week-long period of national mourning was declared by the government, from 23 to 29 March that year.

All flags, including the National Flag, were flown at half-mast during the period.

There was TV coverage of all the work that he has done for Singapore.

About 447,000 people paid their last respects to Lee Kuan Yew at Singapore's Parliament House throughout the 24 hours from Wednesday 10.00 am until Saturday 8.00 pm, 28 March.

In addition, thousands of people lined the roads to watch Lee Kuan Yew move from the Istana to Parliament House on 25 March in the morning.

In total, more than 1.2 million paid their respects and tribute to Lee Kuan Yew at Parliament House and in the 18 tribute centers across the island.

More than 100,000 people lined the streets in heavy rain from Parliament House to the National University of Singapore University Cultural Center on Sunday, 29 March 2015 to see him off.

The other event that had a large effect on Singapore was the Covid-19 pandemic which occurred from 1 December 2019 to the present day.

As for my family my wife had an operation (knee replacement surgery) on her right knee in 2016.

After her recovery we were able to travel to Jerusalem and Alaska in 2017 1nd 2018

In 2019 my wife had an injection into her left eye to stop bleeding in her inner eye.

She recovered and was still able to go to Tokyo Disneyland with grandchildren before the Covid19 pandemic closed all borders and prevented travel.

TABLE OF CONTENT
Introduction – My Country Singapore
Chapter 1 21st Century Singapore (2015-2020)
Chapter 2 Death of Lee Kuan Yew
Chapter 3 2016 Knee Operation
Chapter 4 2017 Trip to Jerusalem
Chapter 5 2018 Alaska
Chapter 6 2019 Eye problem
Chapter 7 COVID 19 (2020-2021)
Chapter 8 2020 Singapore
Chapter 9 The Future for Singapore
Epilogue

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kenneth Kee
• Release date: Aug 19, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005032074

Kenneth Kee

Medical doctor since 1972.Started Kee Clinic in 1974 at 15 Holland Dr #03-102, relocated to 36 Holland Dr #01-10 in 2009.Did my M.Sc (Health Management ) in 1991 and Ph.D (Healthcare Administration) in 1993.Dr Kenneth Kee is still working as a family doctor at the age of 74However he has reduced his consultation hours to 3 hours in the morning and 2 hours inthe afternoon.He first started writing free blogs on medical disorders seen in the clinic in 2007 on http://kennethkee.blogspot.com.His purpose in writing these simple guides was for the health education of his patients which is also his dissertation for his Ph.D (Healthcare Administration). He then wrote an autobiography account of his journey as a medical student to family doctor on his other blog http://afamilydoctorstale.blogspot.comThis autobiography account “A Family Doctor’s Tale” was combined with his early “A Simple Guide to Medical Disorders” into a new Wordpress Blog “A Family Doctor’s Tale” on http://ken-med.com.From which many free articles from the blog was taken and put together into 1000 eBooks.He apologized for typos and spelling mistakes in his earlier books.He will endeavor to improve the writing in futures.Some people have complained that the simple guides are too simple.For their information they are made simple in order to educate the patients.The later books go into more details of medical disorders.He has published 1000 eBooks on various subjects on health, 1 autobiography of his medical journey, another on the autobiography of a Cancer survivor, 2 children stories and one how to study for his nephew and grand-daughter.The purpose of these simple guides is to educate patient on health disorders and not meant as textbooks.He does not do any night duty since 2000 ever since Dr Tan had his second stroke.His clinic is now relocated to the Buona Vista Community Centre.The 2 units of his original clinic are being demolished to make way for a new Shopping Mall.He is now doing some blogging and internet surfing (bulletin boards since the 1980's) startingwith the Apple computer and going to PC.The entire PC is upgraded by himself from XT to the present Pentium duo core.The present Intel i7 CPU is out of reach at the moment because the CPU is still expensive.He is also into DIY changing his own toilet cistern and other electric appliance.His hunger for knowledge has not abated and he is a lifelong learner.The children have all grown up and there are 2 grandchildren who are even more technically advanced than the grandfather where mobile phones are concerned.This book is taken from some of the many articles in his blog (now with 740 posts) A Family Doctor’s Tale.Dr Kee is the author of:"A Family Doctor's Tale""Life Lessons Learned From The Study And Practice Of Medicine""Case Notes From A Family Doctor"

Book preview

A

Personal

Guide

To

Singapore History

Part 4

(2015-2020)

By

Dr Kenneth Kee

M.B.,B.S. (Singapore)

Ph.D (Healthcare Administration)

Copyright Kenneth Kee 2021 Smashwords Edition

Published by Kenneth Kee at Smashwords.com

Dedication

This book is dedicated

To my wife Dorothy

And my children

Carolyn, Grace

And Kelvin

This book describes to A Personal Guide to Singapore History

Part 4

(2015 --2020)

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Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Introduction

My Country Singapore

Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island city-state in Southeast Asia.

Singapore is one of the only three surviving city-states in the world.

The other two are Monaco and Vatican City.

It has a total area of 719 square km.

Its capital and largest city is Singapore (city-state).

Flag of Singapore

The flag of Singapore – two equal horizontal bands of red (top) and white; near the hoist side of the red band, there is a vertical, white crescent (closed portion is toward the hoist side) partially enclosing five white five-pointed stars arranged in a circle; red denotes brotherhood and equality; white signifies purity and virtue; the waxing crescent moon symbolizes a young nation on the ascendancy; the five stars represent the nation’s ideals of democracy, peace, progress, justice, and equality.

English, Tamil, Malay and Chinese are its official languages.

The diversity of Singapore made Singlish, a colloquial Singaporean English, the de-facto language of the state.

Its official currency is Singapore dollar (SGD).

Singapore can teach the world some lessons in honesty.

The tiny city-state is the least corrupt in Asia and the 5th least corrupt country in the world.

Singapore is made up of 63 islands, including the main island, which is known as Singapore Island to most people, but is also known as Pulau Ujong.

There are two man-made connections to Johor, Malaysia: the Johor–Singapore Causeway in the north, and the Tuas Second Link in the west.

Jurong Island, Pulau Tekong, Pulau Ubin and Sentosa are the largest of Singapore's smaller islands.

The highest natural point is Bukit Timah Hill at 166 m (545 ft).

The lowest natural point is Singapore Strait 0 m.

About 23% of Singapore's land area is forest and nature reserves.

Urbanization has removed most primary rainforest, with Bukit Timah Nature Reserve the only significant remaining forest.

Even though there is very little primary rainforest left, there are more than 300 parks and four nature reserves in Singapore.

There are also many trees planted all over Singapore and almost fifty per cent of the country is covered by trees and plants.

Because of this, Singapore is also often known as the 'Garden City'.

Singapore has its national tree planting day on 7th November every year.

Everyone from the Prime Minister to foreign diplomats to ordinary citizens’ plant trees on this day.

Singaporeans even adopt and name trees for their children as birthday gifts or wedding presents.

But when Singapore plants trees, it plants them in style.

The government opened up a series of manmade solar-powered trees, up to 50 meters high, in the ‘Gardens at the Bay’ project.

It is now a cultural symbol and a tourist hotspot.

The only tropical garden with a UNESCO World Heritage Site tag is the 156-year-old Singapore Botanical Garden.

With 4.5 million annual visitors and a National Orchid Garden, it is the mother of all botanic gardens.

Singaporean kids are smarter than the rest.

They collectively topped the global math-and-science-education ranking, by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

Ainan Celeste Cawley, of Singapore, is a record holder for being the youngest child ever to pass O-level chemistry, at 7 years old.

At 9 years he cracked the Physics O level certificate, too.

Singapore, being a small country, has been reclaiming land from the sea around the island.

The first time Singapore started to reclaim land was in the 1960s.

The total land area of Singapore at that time was 581.5 km² and it has increased to 730 km² in the 2010s, which is an increase of about 20% in total land area.

It may grow by another 100 km² (40 sq miles) by 2030.

Some land reclamation projects involve joining together smaller islands to make larger islands with more uses, like Jurong Island.

Singapore uses the landfill method to reclaim the sea at the south of the country, but polders have been recently used too.

The country's rapid reclamation projects have made disputes with its neighboring countries, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Singapore is conquering Asia sand by sand….literally. Singapore has been accused of buying too much sand from Malaysia, Cambodia and Vietnam.

It led to several protests and blockades on sand trade after countries found chunks of their land being shipped off to Singapore.

Singapore is very passionate about toilets.

The Singapore government tabled a UN resolution to designate 19th November as the World Toilet Day.

It not only got the support of 122 other countries but the World Toilet Organization was formed on 19th November 2001, in Singapore.

In Singapore, parents teach their kids good manners while the government teaches the parents some.

Singapore actually had a government-backed National Courtesy Campaign, since 1979, where Singaporeans were taught ethics and mannerisms.

However, in 2001, it changed to the Singapore Kindness Movement.

More than 80% of Singapore’s population lives in government-subsidized houses while the home ownership rate in Singapore is a staggering 92% (The highest in the world).

Singapore has emerged as one of the world’s most prosperous countries.

It is a financial center, an achievement in urban planning, and serves as a model for developing nations.

A person does not get rich in Singapore without thanking Singapore.

Singapore prints the entire lyrics of its national anthem into