I am not sure whether I am about to say goodbye to the Golden Mile Complex which has just been sold for $700 million to a consortium consisting of Perennial Holdings, Sino Land and Far East Organization. Hopefully not. Most likely, yes. But meanwhile, let’s share some memories.
GMC is the Thais’ Lucky Plaza or Myanmarese’s Peninsula Plaza. It has the largest supermarket of Thai products. You want Thai newspapers or gossip magazines? Get them from stalls which will also offer you fairly authentic Thai knick-knacks, ranging from fake ivory keychains to face powder. There are a number of Thai restaurants to go to after you’ve done your shopping or booked your bus or plane tickets to Bangkok, Chiangmai or Phuket. And if, by evening, you are still around the complex in what was technically Woh Hup Complex before that got commercially merged with the original adjacent GMC which was a separate place before the whole place became one big Golden Mile Complex – it’s disco time!
The last time I was there, three discotheques called Thai Disco 1, 2 and 3 dotted the complex. Thai disco is quite interesting. It’s rowdy. Everyone sans the singers, dancers and bands seems to be wearing black or white – the customers, bouncers and waitresses and whoever are selling whatever they are selling.
Thai pop music is a mixture of yelling and chanting. Sometimes jarring to those not used to it but overall, melodious and seductive enough to get you in the mood for more than tom yum goong or pad thai. Yes, after the fourth bottle of Chang or Singha beer, you are ready for anything.
Suddenly, a Thai lady comes up to you and whispers, not in Thai but in something sounding like, “Hello, sir, how are you? What’s your name? I’m Morning Dew.” You are tempted to reply, “And I am the Midnight Scholar.” Having seen some gory Thai films where heads are cut off for less, you say you are Richard and offer to buy her a drink, but quickly before asking how much. Morning Dew puts up three fingers. Definitely not $3. Can’t be $300 (or can it). Anyway, it’s three red Yusof Ishaks. You say, yes. Morning Dew stays with you for a record time of three minutes, one for each $10 (what do you expect?), makes some totally incomprehensible but somehow delightful conversation and flits off to another Midnight Scholar doing serious research into Beach Road nightlife.
That’s basically the Woh Hup side of GMC. It was also a place where you booked your coach tickets to Malaysia. At one time, long queues, now no more. Online ticketing changed the scene somewhat. Things are more orderly. There is competition among services fighting for more affluent middle-class passengers who are prepared to pay a bit more. You will not find aunties lugging vegetables or fish from Johor Bahru anymore, more likely young female retirees carrying Coach bags.
GMC was also known for its massage parlours, not so much now but in the 1980s, and, for a period, an x-rated cinema like the Yangtze cinema in Pearl Centre, Eu Ting Sen Street. The cinema in GMC also became a ketai theatre for a while. There was a “concert” starring, I can’t remember the name, a former female Taiwan lawmaker caught having sex with a married man on a viral video. The “show” at the Golden Theatre was a strange mix of she coming in and out of the stage in different seductive dresses to say something or sing a ditty against a backdrop of press cuttings about her. You could say she was selling notoriety.
Does the GMC I knew belong to a rich and colourful past which may not return? There’s a bit of a NIMBY in current official thinking. NOT IN MY BACKYARD, if we can help it. Maybe Geylang or Orchard Towers, if you need it. Otherwise, fly budget to Batam, Patpong or wherever the silver-haired brigade can spend their excess CPF on.
The consortium which now owns GMC says the complex, built in 1973, will be “sensitively restored”, with special attention paid to retaining its key features and signature terraced profile.
Yes, the building was gazetted as a conserved building in October last year in light of its historical and architectural significance.
I have yet to see any recent gentrification effort which has even bothered to try for the co-existence of the real colourful human past and flavour and the building. Just retaining the facades may not be enough. It is a cop-out.
Tan Bah Bah, consulting editor of TheIndependent.Sg, is a former senior leader writer with The Straits Times. He was also managing editor of a local magazine publishing company.