Singapore faces a rapidly ageing population. And before the pandemic, social service interventions to address isolation and loneliness revolved around community befriending programmes, counselling services, as well as day activities and rehabilitation. However, what happens during a pandemic, especially with a virus most deadly to the most vulnerable? How do we overcome the risks of social and emotional distancing, while maintaining physical distancing? We speak to Justina Teo, Senior Manager at Lions Befrienders (https://www.lionsbefrienders.org.sg/). Since 1995, Lions Befrienders has been matching trained befrienders to seniors through weekly home visits, and we chat about the work of her agency, the needs of the elders they serve, as well as the future of befriending services in Singapore.

The late American celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain described Singapore’s food scene as having: “More variety, more options, more specialties from many lands. And cheap”. Yet, since the first coronavirus case was announced in the country, F&B businesses have had to adjust. Through conversations with an F&B owner and a team which created a crowdsourced hawker directory, we want to understand both the problems as well as the ground-up solutions. We speak to Chua Ee Chien (Jekyll & Hyde cocktail bar https://www.facebook.com/JekyllAndHyde.SG/ and bars.sg) as well as Lim Yi Fan (FoodLeh?: https://foodleh.web.app/). We also highlight the online gift-card initiative Chope & Save (chopeandsave.com), started by a team of five in their 20s.

The rapid spread of the coronavirus among migrant workers has reflected serious lapses in Singapore’s pandemic planning in the country, but it would be remiss to not discuss the policies surrounding migrant workers and immigration in a more systemic or structural manner. For this, we turn to Professor Kenneth Paul Tan of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, at the National University of Singapore, who is an expert on Singapore’s politics, society, and culture. He has written extensively and holistically on the tensions and contradictions around Singapore’s transition from a developmental state to a neoliberal global city. On Labour Day, we focus on chapter 6, “Moral panic and the migrant worker folk devil”, of this 2017 book, titled, “Governing global-city Singapore: Legacies and futures after Lee Kuan Yew” (https://www.routledge.com/Governing-Global-City-Singapore-Legacies-and-Futures-After-Lee-Kuan-Yew/Tan/p/book/9781138344150). In the chapter, he discusses the effect of Singapore’s deeper participation in neoliberal globalisation and the tensions resulting from higher levels of immigration. We first invite him to explain theories such as neoliberal globalisation and political authoritarianism (as well as pragmatism and technocracy), to set the context of our conversation. Next, we trace our growing reliance on migrant labour in neo-authoritarian Singapore, leading to an evaluation of the present migrant worker situation. We also cover events in 2013 - the Population White Paper, the protests, and the Little India riot - and the extent of continuity we might be experiencing. Finally, we think about how ideological shifts in the country might look like.

Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic in Singapore, I’ve been closely following the Facebook updates of former colleague Brenda Tan, with whom I used to work at the former news site “The Middle Ground”. A few days ago, she posted a powerful reflection about her personal experience, which you will hear in this episode. Singaporean blogger mrbrown also shared Brenda’s post on Twitter. On regular episodes, we document community initiatives and discuss structural challenges. Yet, inspired by her post - as well as a recent podcast by “The New York Times” titled “Voices of the pandemic” - we speak with Singaporeans about their daily lives, studying, working, and staying at home, and ask them how routines have been disrupted. This week, we caught up with seven Singaporeans in their 20s: Undergraduate Jaime Han and working professional Estella Ho (10:31); First-time mother and social worker Nur Sakinah Rahmat (17:41); Working professional Lim RuiWen (22:00); Undergraduates Lee Gui An (26:25) and Amirul Hakim Bin Abdul Hamid (33:35); and Journalist Keshia Naurana Badalge (38:50).

In the context of the pandemic and the circuit breaker in Singapore, the designation of psychological treatments as a non-essential service is an obvious starting point. Yet, it also seems appropriate to both consider the state of mental health wellness and advocacy in the country before the pandemic, as well as our aspirations for where we want mental health wellness and advocacy to be. Nominated member of parliament Anthea Ong has been an advocate for improved affordability, accessibility, and quality of mental health services, who started her advocacy even before her appointment in 2018. In addition to her motivations and perspectives, our conversation revolved around the evolution of her thinking, her concerns during this circuit breaker and pandemic, and her important calls to action.

Singapore is expected to enter a full-year recession, and the ripple effect of pay cuts and hiring freezes is just beginning. Even with the Unity, Resilience, and Solidarity Budgets, graduating students from the institutes of higher learning and the universities are justifiably anxious. We focus on the internship and employment challenges faced by Singaporean students. We speak to Adriel Yong, who started a spreadsheet to collate opportunities for students looking for summer internships (tinyurl.com/summeropps2020), and Mock Yi Jun (Advisory Singapore: advisory.sg), who leads a non-profit dedicated to empowering young Singaporeans to make informed career and further education choices.

Not having a computer or an Internet connection, it might be argued, is symbolic of the many challenges faced by low-income Singaporean households (with school-going children). And even with government assistance - beyond the provision of such technological necessities - individuals and community groups have also stepped up, offering other forms of assistance to Singaporeans who may have fallen through the cracks. We speak to Lim May-Ann (Engineering Good's Computers against COVID: https://engineeringgood.org/computers-against-covid/) as well as David Hoe (Project Stable Staples: projectstablestaples.sg).

Mutual aid initiatives - facilitating the exchange of resources and services for mutual benefit - started as Google spreadsheets, but could potentially evolve into virtual and ground communities which last beyond the coronavirus pandemic. We speak to Rachel Ooi (Mutual Aid Hub: aidhubsg.com) as well as Abhishek Bajaj and Vincent Ng (A Good Space: agoodspace.org) to learn more about their work and motivations, the challenges, and the way forward.