Singapore

A settlement called Temasek, and later Singapura, stood at the mouth of the river in the fourteenth century, a minor port in the world of Srivijaya and Majapahit whose remains are still being excavated on Fort Canning hill. It faded, and by 1819, when Stamford Raffles of the British East India Company signed a treaty with local rulers to establish a trading post, the island held only a small Malay and Orang Laut population. Declared a free port, it grew with extraordinary speed, drawing merchants and labourers from southern China, the Malay archipelago and South India, and became part of the Straits Settlements in 1826.

By 1900 it was among the busiest ports in the world, shipping tin and rubber from the peninsula. The fall of Singapore to Japanese forces in February 1942 ended the British claim to invulnerability, and the occupation that followed, with mass killings of Chinese residents, is remembered as the darkest period in the island's history. Post-war politics moved quickly: self-government in 1959 under Lee Kuan Yew and the People's Action Party, merger with Malaysia in 1963, and expulsion from it in August 1965, leaving a small island state with no hinterland and no natural resources.

What followed is the country's founding story: industrial estates, a national housing programme that moved most of the population into high-rise flats, compulsory military service, English-medium schooling and a port and airline built to serve world trade. Corruption was suppressed, dissent was contained, and income per head rose from the level of a poor country to among the highest anywhere. Lee Kuan Yew stepped down in 1990 and died in 2015; the party he built has governed without interruption since 1959.

Singapore defines itself as a multiracial society, with Chinese, Malay, Indian and Eurasian communities and four official languages. Race is managed deliberately — quotas in public housing blocks, religious harmony laws, a national pledge recited in schools — and the calendar reflects it, with Chinese New Year, Hari Raya, Deepavali, Vesak, Christmas and Good Friday all public holidays. English is the working language and Singlish, its clipped local form with Hokkien and Malay borrowings, is the informal one.

The culture rewards order and effort. Meritocracy, examinations, home ownership and what locals call kiasu — a fear of losing out — are discussed by Singaporeans themselves with a mixture of pride and complaint. Public space is clean and regulated, and the rules are enforced with fines that have given the city its international reputation. The arts have been funded heavily since the 1990s, and a conservation movement has preserved the shophouse quarters after decades of demolition.

Food is the strongest shared identity. Hawker culture was inscribed on UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage in 2020, and arguments about the best stall for any dish cross every community line. Alongside it sit the Peranakan or Straits Chinese heritage of Katong, the Malay traditions of Kampong Glam and Geylang Serai, Tamil festivals in Little India, and the temple, mosque and church calendars that overlap through the year. Visitors are expected to observe the courtesies of each: shoes off, shoulders covered, and no photographs during prayers.

About 6 million people live on an island of roughly 730 square kilometres, making it one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Around 4 million are citizens and permanent residents; the rest are foreign workers and professionals on passes, from construction and domestic workers to bankers. Some eight in ten residents live in flats built by the Housing and Development Board, in self-contained towns with their own markets, hawker centres, clinics and MRT stations, and most of those flats are owned rather than rented.

The economy runs on the port and airport, banking and asset management, oil refining and petrochemicals on Jurong Island, electronics and pharmaceutical manufacturing, and the regional headquarters of international companies. Working hours are long, national service is compulsory for male citizens, and the cost of living — above all housing and the certificate needed to own a car — is the constant domestic complaint, alongside immigration and an ageing population.

Daily rhythm is air-conditioned. People move between flat, train, office and mall with short bursts of heat in between, eat out constantly because hawker food is cheaper than cooking, and exercise early in the morning or after dark in the park connectors that link the island's green spaces. Weekends are for family meals, the beaches at East Coast and Sentosa, and short trips over the causeway to Malaysia. Sunday is when domestic workers gather in the open spaces of Little India and Orchard Road on their day off.

Hawker centres are the heart of it: covered halls of specialist stalls where a plate costs a few dollars and where, since 2020, the culture itself is on UNESCO's intangible heritage list. Hainanese chicken rice — poached bird with rice cooked in its stock, chilli and ginger sauces alongside — is the national dish by common consent. Chilli crab, stir-fried in a sweet, thick tomato and chilli gravy and eaten with fried mantou buns, is the celebratory one, with black pepper crab beside it.

Laksa is the great hybrid: rice noodles in a coconut and prawn-paste gravy, and in the Katong version the noodles are cut short so the whole bowl can be eaten with a spoon. Chinese stalls also sell char kway teow, flat noodles fried with cockles and lard; Hokkien mee; bak kut teh, pork ribs in a peppery broth; and wonton and fishball noodles. Malay and Indonesian cooking brings nasi lemak, coconut rice with fried anchovies, egg and sambal; satay; and mee rebus. Indian Singapore contributes roti prata, biryani, thosai and fish head curry, a local invention.

Breakfast is kaya toast — charcoal-grilled bread with coconut-and-egg jam and a slab of cold butter — with soft-boiled eggs and strong coffee, kopi, ordered in a shorthand of its own. Tea is pulled between two cups as teh tarik. Fruit means durian, sold from roadside stalls in the mid-year season and banned from the trains for its smell, alongside mangosteen and rambutan. Alcohol is expensive and taxed heavily, and public drinking is restricted at night, so evenings tend to end over supper rather than over drinks.