I may be unable to wander Europe anymore, but wanderlust still strikes me from time to time, so today I went to the Bukit Timah campus to do some sightseeing.

The whole place is in a mess; everything is under construction. If it was like this today, at the end of Week 3, I can't imagine what it was like when school first started. Either Law was in a big hurry to get out of Kent Ridge, Kent Ridge was in a big hurry to get them out, or both - "Good riddance to bad rubbish!", as I'd imagine the cries went up from the twain. Right now the inhabitable space is still small and quiet, but once the dust settles and LKYSPP and friends move over, it's going to be more lively.

Walking through the place, I found that it'd been renovated to match or at least complement the decor and colour scheme of Kent Ridge. So at least the Landscape of Exclusion doesn't exist (yet), but then, with it being in a different location altogether, such measures are probably no longer necessary. The place might not be in a ridge, but the area is hilly and so climbing to get around is still necessary (dang). Some of the staircases are screwed up - they can be entered from any floor, but you can only exit from the first floor since the handles on the inside are disabled. The corridors are wider than in Kent Ridge, which is good in case there is an influx of SNAILS, but otherwise I don't see what's so good about moving, especially since the library is now so far from the student block (though then again, the steepness of the staircases in the library was pointed out to me, so this will be good for those who are into certain forms of wildlife spotting). I hope the moving was really necessary, since with the renovation, new shuttle bus, maintenance of the new campus et al., I forsee that school fees are going to rise. Yet again.

Unfortunately, the cafeteria sucks, at least from what I've been told; I only ate a little there but the results were not promising - most of my fruit juice was ice and the "tomato ketchup" for my fries was extremely watered down. The price for NUS students is like what you'd get in a hawker centre (I'd imagine you're paying for the air-conditioning), so essentially you're not saving anything. One stall has Makansutra and Channel U approval but one person told me it sucks. Meanwhile another has newspaper writeups, but I think it's not supposed to be very good either. On the up side, Serene Centre is within walking distance (maybe not if you're in catwalk attire and stilettos), and Coronation Centre just a bit further. [Aside: Island Creamery at Serene Centre provides good quality ice cream for a low, low price of $2.50 a scoop. It's much better value than the BJ I had on Sunday which cost me my brother-in-law, who is anal and insufferable enough to complain to me about a "factual inaccuracy", insists that I change it, and then wonders why I do not rush to fall at his feet and gush about his munificence and then perpetually tries to act as a travel agent for a guilt trip, bitches and attempts to emotionally blackmail me all the time, $4.50. Though the Apple Pie ice cream didn't have enough apple bits in it.] The services at Bukit Timah also aren't very good - there's a co-op branch but it's only open from 10-2 or some equally insane time (this is the price they pay for exclusivity).

The shuttle bus service BTC1 has a frequency of 15 minutes during normal times and comfortably whisks visitors between campuses within about 20 minutes (in normal traffic conditions). Which means that some people are going to use it as a SBS service 151 substitute. I forsee that this bus is going to become more utilised than intended.

All in all, moving to Bukit Timah just reinforces the divide between SNAILS and SLUGS. They get a gym all to themselves (still unopened - it better not be Law-only) while SLUGS have to jostle with each other in the MPSH. The SLUGS will rot away and everyone will forget about them, since they have evidently forgotten about us; no one told the rest of NUS that the Sports Complex was available for our use from 2-6pm on Fridays (we pay school fees too, ok?) Also, the new distance does nothing to encourage integration: Law students in normal ECAs, for example, will have another reason to quit, thus leaving the path of one of the avenues for inter-faculty cohesion and understanding. Consider too that the SNAILS are still coming in (I saw 2 people doing chemistry in the cafeteria), providing one more source of tension and potential escalation. Very soon, I say, we're going to have racial inter-faculty riots!

I plan on going on another factfinding journey around the exam period, and see if SNAILS are still hanging around in the library.


Glossary:

SNAILS = Students Not Actually In Law School
SLUGS = Stupid Law UnderGraduateS


Other reviews of the NUS Bukit Timah Campus:

Welcome to the Bukit Timah Campus

[Addendum: Oh, about the only advantage of the new campus is that we finally have a quadrangle!]