28 October, 2023

by Catherine Lim 

It was the April-Jun 2012 edition of Nature Watch, the Nature Society of Singapore (NSS) bi- monthly magazine of hot topics. This one featured the position paper and recommendations for Bukit Brown Cemetery together with a ed-op piece and photo feature titled “Spirit of Bukit Brown” The latter by Ilsa Sharpe, who was on a visit from Perth, which was now home. A revisit was undertaken in the light of news following the announcement of an eight-lane highway that would bifurcate the cemetery.

First Dr. Ho Hua Chew presented some of the reasons for preservation:

ECOSYETEM SERVICES
1) Carbon Sequestration
While our eco footprint is on par with that of first world nations then, “Singapore should take up the challenge of becoming not just a red dot to the world, given that the crisis of global warming has intensified to an alarming degree.”

12 years later climate change is an existentialist crisis. Globally, governments have had to face extreme weather devastation from blistering heat to numb blinding cold. Mitigating climate change requires new sustainable and equitable goals. There is a place for Bukit Brown in this.

2) Natural air-conditioning. If you have ever been to Bukit Brown, then you will have felt what I mean. Nothing more to say.

3) Rainfall sponge. It rains often in Singapore, but it also evaporates fast in our concrete jungle, the wooded areas of Bukit Brown, retains water, and “allow a slower percolation of water into the ground.” This helps prevent or reduce floods.”

Biodiversity

With the formulation of the Master Plan for the Conservation of Nature which was published, NSS had been monitoring the bird life in Bukit Brown.

Their highlights:

94 resident and migrant bird species have been recorded. That’s 26% of 364 bird species recorded under the NSS checklist in 2007. “Impressive” is how Ho describes this figure, given the landscape is mainly woodland.

Nationally threatened birds include the White-bellied Woodpecker (critically endangered and rare). The Spotted Wood Owl and Grey-headed Fish Eagle all in the same category of rare, and critically endangered; 56 species listed in the Red Data Book is 27%, making the cemetery an important site for biodiversity conservation.

Forest Birds – Extended Habitat
Bukit Brown serves as an important habitat and foraging ground for many forest species. Their presence which includes the Malkoha, Asian Fairy Bluebird and Black-headed Bulbul is probably due to over-crowding, especially at the Macritchie Forest part of the Central Catchment Nature Reserve (CCNR)., opposite Lornie Road where Bukit Brown is located. There is also a disconnect with the reservoir and the golf course at Sime Road to the west, and the dam and open ground to the east.

From Bukit Brown it is “a skip and a hop” to the Southern Parks and Ridges. With the cemetery situated south of CCNR, it acts “as a bridge” to include Botanic Gardens to the Istana and Fort Canning. Bukit Brown facilitates as close to a contiguous route for forest birds to the South.

An interesting record of a Large Flying Fox was sighted close to the expressway transect area. A common sight in the past, it is now nationally extinct. It was probably a visitor from Johor or Indonesia. It is a rare sighting which indicates Bukit Brown holds promise for other wildlife apart from the birds.

Since this article was written, there have been sightings by the tomb keepers of the rare Sunda Pangolins as reported by all things Bukit Brown. 

To summarise the impact of an eight- lane highway: 

The expressway approximately 2 km in length cuts through the area close to MacRitchie Forest, going diagonally across the only big valley with a flowing river, and I would add the most beautiful part of Bukit Brown, with thick woodlands along the shoulders and surround areas on both sides of the valley. 

Most of these will probably be wiped out by the construction of the highway. Most of the forest species which used Bukit Brown as a launching pad for foraging will lose their habitat because of the damage and destruction, wreaked. Forest birds are not long-distance flyers.  The proposal for the 600 meter “vehicular bridge” although allowing for the river to continue flowing, will with its massive width cast a huge shadow underneath. Deprived of sunlight, the plants  will wither and die.

In, 2012:

The Nature Society of Singapore recommends and advocates:

The whole of area of Bukit Brown be designated as a heritage park, with cultural and nature/ecological components integrated into one entity. This also allows for other recreational facilities and activities that are in harmony with the dual-heritage dimension of the park. Such activities include horse riding strolling, hiking, cycling and more. The heritage park should be proposed to the UN as an UNESCO World Heritage Park to draw the tourists – if Singapore ratifies the UNESCO World Heritage Convention. “

On May 15. 2014, having ratified the convention, the Botanic Gardens was inscribed as our first UNESCO Heritage Site.

In 2023, all things Bukit Brown, advocates and recommends that Bukit Brown Cemetery be considered for inscription as the twin to Botanic Gardens, following its success. Also, a cultural site, it tells the story of our migrant nation, embedded with exquisite and simple stonework, with inscriptions that speak of revolution and peace, and represents tangible records of ordinary times of ordinary lives from Coolies to Capitan Cinas, in colonial times.

One of the rare battlegrounds from WWII which are still intact in parts, despite the highway which cut through the last known locations where soldiers were recorded to have fell. There are mass graves from WWII still not uncovered.

Lest we forget.

This will be a fitting remembrance of our war dead, a memorial and a national heritage park. 

Remember Where We Came From

“We are Singaporeans together on a small island. We are anchored by our emotional links with family and friends and by our shared sense of our history, and our common destiny. We are not just here, materialised from nowhere, appeared out of a Transformers movie, maybe, we came here somewhere, sometime there was a history to it and it is crucial to remember where we came from, how we got here”

PM Lee Hsien Loong, National Day Rally speech, 2011

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There is a Chinese saying, ” 飲水思源” translated, “remember the source of the water.”

The carbon sink (photo : Ho Hua Chew)

Birds of Bukit Brown (Nature Society of Singapore: Nature Watch)

Horse-riding and strolling, extracted from Nature Watch 2012

Intertwining Guided Walks of History, Habitat and Heritage

It’s like a three- in-one and atBB has recorded over 20,000 participants to such walks. 

atBB guided walk at the grave of Tan Chor Nam

Five Cats Grave

The group welfie by Kenneth of appreciative participants

Simple grave from bricks, one of the earliest industries on the island

Elaborate 3-D grave

The grave of Tan Kim Ching. Kapitan Cina, Special Envoy in the Siamese court, scion of Tan Tock Seng

This blog post is extracted and adapted from a 2012 issue of Nature Watch. with thanks to the Nature Society of Singapore especially, Dr. Ho Hua Chew.  Coming up “ The Spirit of Bukit Brown” by Ilsa Sharp.