Returning to Singapore After 30 Years: Seeing My Past Through New Eyes

There are places we visit, and there are places that somehow become part of who we are.

Singapore has always been one of those places for me, although I don't think I fully understood that until I returned.

I moved to Singapore when I was around fourteen and a half years old and spent my teenage years there from 1995 to 2000. It was a formative period of my life, before I eventually moved to Canada and began another chapter.

More than thirty years after first arriving in Singapore, I returned.

This time, I wasn't a teenager trying to understand a new country and a changing life. I was returning as an adult, a mother, an artist and a business owner who had lived many different chapters since leaving.

And beside me was my daughter, almost exactly the age I had been when I first moved there.

That detail stayed with me throughout the trip.

I Didn't Feel Like a Tourist

One of the biggest surprises was how natural it felt to be back.

Singapore has changed enormously. There are more buildings, more shopping centres, an expanded MRT system and entire areas that look different from what I remember.

Yet underneath all of those changes, it was familiar.

For the first couple of days, I used navigation regularly. After that, I found myself needing it less and less. I understood the MRT. I recognized areas. I knew how things connected.

Sometimes we would take the wrong exit from an MRT station and end up on a different street, but even then, I never really felt lost.

I didn't feel like a tourist.

And slowly, a thought became very clear to me:

Singapore feels like home.

That realization surprised me.

For much of my adult life, when I travelled back to places from my past, it was usually because family was there. I understood the connection to those places, but I didn't necessarily experience them as home.

Singapore was different.

I felt comfortable.

I felt peaceful.

I felt as though some part of me already understood where I was.

Perhaps home isn't always where we were born, where our family lives, or even where we currently live.

Sometimes it is simply a place where something inside us becomes quiet and says, I know this place.

Somehow, I Chose the Same Neighbourhood

There was another interesting realization during the trip.

When I booked our hotel, I knew I was choosing somewhere relatively close to where I had once lived. I didn't think much more about it.

As the days passed and I started recognizing MRT stations, streets and familiar places, I realized something.

I had essentially chosen the same neighbourhood where I used to live—just from a different corner.

Places that had once been part of my everyday life were suddenly only ten or fifteen minutes away.

I hadn't consciously planned it that way.

Somehow, after all those years, I had naturally returned to almost exactly the same area.

Returning to My Old Home

One place I knew I wanted to see was the house where I used to live.

It was raining that day, and my daughter and I walked for about an hour from our hotel to get there.

When I finally stood in front of the house, I was simply happy.

The exterior had changed over the years, although parts of it still felt familiar. I didn't want to disturb the people living there. I just wanted a few quiet minutes to look at it and acknowledge what that place had once represented in my life.

I took a photograph of myself standing outside.

Later, when I looked at the picture, I noticed something unexpected.

The rain had created a wet mark on my clothing that looked almost exactly like a heart, directly over my chest.

Maybe it was simply rain.

But sometimes a small detail captures a feeling better than words can.

Seeing My School Through My Daughter's Eyes

I also wanted to show my daughter where I had gone to school.

The school has changed location since I attended, and it has grown enormously. When I was a student, there were approximately 50 students. Today, it has hundreds of international students.

Seeing that growth was fascinating.

But what affected me even more was experiencing it with my daughter.

I was approximately fourteen and a half when I moved to Singapore.

She was approximately fourteen and a half when I brought her back with me.

Thirty years apart. Two completely different lives. Yet almost exactly the same point in adolescence.

I couldn't help thinking about the girl I had been while looking at the young woman standing beside me.

There was something very special about being able to show her a part of my life that, until then, had mostly existed through my stories.

Different, Yet Somehow the Same

That became one of the recurring feelings of the trip.

Singapore had changed, but it hadn't.

One day, we returned to a small place where I remembered eating more than twenty years ago.

When we arrived, I was asked whether I had been there before.

My answer was essentially, "It depends. How long have you been in business?"

More than twenty years.

Then yes, I had.

I even found an old photograph that helped me identify where I had been sitting all those years ago.

The business had changed internally. Things had moved around and it had expanded, but it was still there.

I ordered a soup that I was fairly certain I had ordered all those years ago.

It was such a simple experience, but it represented so much of the trip.

Familiar, but different.

Changed, but still recognizable.

Rediscovering a Creative Part of Myself

Something else began happening while I was in Singapore.

I started noticing things again.

Not just the major attractions, but small things.

Independent shops. Art. Clothing. Textiles. Handmade paper. Interesting household objects. Beautiful presentations. Unusual pieces that made me stop simply because someone had thought to create them.

We visited galleries and wandered through small shops filled with things I would rarely see at home.

Sometimes I didn't even necessarily want to buy what I was looking at.

I just enjoyed seeing it.

I remember looking at something unusual and thinking, This is interesting. Someone thought of this.

That reaction made me realize something about myself.

I have always been creative. I have always noticed beauty and unusual details.

But somewhere along the way, I think I partially neglected that side of myself.

Life becomes practical.

We work. We take care of our families. We solve problems. We build routines. Without realizing it, we can become very efficient at moving through life without stopping to notice what inspires us.

Singapore reminded me to notice again.

Colour.

Design.

Texture.

Art.

Small details.

Ideas that exist simply because someone wanted to make something different.

I hadn't realized how much I missed that.

Looking at My Own Work Differently

As a business owner, it was impossible not to observe how people created experiences.

I noticed independent businesses, thoughtful presentation and the individuality behind so many small details.

It made me think about my own studio and the kind of business I want to continue building.

Shibui has never been about doing more simply for the sake of doing more. I have always been drawn to thoughtful work, personal attention and creating an environment where people can feel comfortable.

But Singapore reminded me that calm and creativity don't have to be opposites.

Simplicity doesn't have to mean removing personality.

Professionalism doesn't have to mean becoming predictable.

There is room for beauty, curiosity, individuality and playfulness while still creating something refined and intentional.

I don't know exactly how that realization will influence my work yet.

And I don't think I need to.

Maybe My Story With Singapore Isn't Finished

This was perhaps the most unexpected feeling I brought home.

I don't feel as though my story with Singapore is finished.

I don't know what that means.

I don't know whether Singapore will eventually become somewhere I work, teach, collaborate, visit regularly, or simply return to whenever I need to reconnect with this part of myself.

I'm certainly not packing my belongings and moving tomorrow.

Life has responsibilities, timing matters, and there are many practical realities involved.

But I came home with a very strong feeling that Singapore may somehow connect with both home and business in a future chapter of my life.

For now, I'm comfortable not knowing what that looks like.

Sometimes we don't need to immediately turn a feeling into a plan.

We can simply pay attention to it.

One Last Piece of the Past

There was one final moment that stayed with me.

On the morning we left Singapore, we were travelling to the airport at around six o'clock.

The streets were unusually quiet. There were barely any cars, and the city was only beginning to wake up.

Then I saw a school bus.

It belonged to Overseas Family School—the school my brother had attended when we lived in Singapore.

I hadn't visited his old school during this trip.

Of all the days we had been there, and all the streets we had travelled, there it was on the final morning as I was leaving.

I immediately told my daughter to take a picture.

The photograph is blurry. It was six in the morning, we were tired, and everything happened quickly.

But I love what that moment represented.

It felt almost as though one last piece of my old Singapore had appeared to send me home.

Whether it was coincidence or something more doesn't really matter.

The moment meant something to me.

Returning Without Going Backwards

Before travelling, I wondered what returning would feel like.

Would I feel nostalgic?

Would I feel sad?

Would I wish I could return to that period of my life?

Surprisingly, that wasn't what happened.

I felt peaceful.

I didn't want to become the teenager who once lived there again.

I could appreciate her.

I could understand her differently.

And I could see how much of her still exists in the person I am today.

The countries I've lived in, the people I've met, the cultures I've experienced and the different versions of myself that existed in each place have all contributed something.

None of them has to be my entire identity.

Perhaps that is part of what being a citizen of the world means to me.

Home doesn't always have to be one place.

The Same Place, a Different Person

I returned to Singapore thinking I was revisiting an important place from my past.

Instead, the trip showed me something about my present.

I am still curious.

I am still creative.

I still notice details.

I still want to discover things.

And perhaps I needed to return somewhere familiar to recognize parts of myself that had quietly moved into the background.

Thirty years ago, Singapore helped shape a teenage girl who was learning how large the world could be.

This time, it reminded that same person—now a mother, an artist and a business owner—that there is still more to discover.

I don't know where my connection with Singapore will take me next.

I only know that this time, I don't want to wait another twenty or thirty years before returning.

Maybe returning isn't always about going back.

Sometimes we return to an old place so we can see more clearly how far we've travelled.

And sometimes, we discover that the story isn't over yet.