Director’s Note

This year marks the 15th anniversary of the Suzhou Industrial Park in China. In conjunction with the anniversary celebration, a bilingual exhibition “Adapting Singapore’s Experience – Commemorating the 15th Anniversary of Suzhou Industrial Park”, was held at the National Library from 15 May to 15 June. The “Spotlight” article in Mandarin highlights the books and resources on the Suzhou Industrial Park and other parts of China. These are available at the Lee Kong Chian Reference Library’s China Resource Collection on Level 9 of the National Library.

Once again, we are pleased to publish the research findings of our Lee Kong Chian Research Fellows: Katrina Gulliver, Loh Kah Seng and Kelvin Low. Katrina Gulliver gives an account of how important Malacca was to Europe and how the city developed under Portuguese and Dutch influences. Loh Kah Seng looks at the misconceptions of emergency housing in postwar Southeast Asia and Hong Kong. Samsui women played an important role in Singapore's nation-building. In his paper, Kelvin Low discusses the different means through which samsui women are portrayed and remembered in media constructions found in newspaper reports and popular history books.

In this issue, read all about the close and strategic ties Singapore has forged with the Middle East and India through the years. Singapore strongly advocates for India to play a greater role in the Asia-Pacific region. It paved the way for India’s association with the ASEAN Regional Forum and supported India’s bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong’s visits to the Middle East in 2004 resulted in Singapore hosting the inaugural Asia-Middle East Dialogue in June 2005 and the launch of the Middle East Business Group by the Singapore Business Federation in March 2007.

The resources on Islamic banking and the sports collection of the Lee Kong Chian Reference Library are featured in this issue. Chrita Orang Yang Chari Slamat, translated into Baba Malay from John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, is part of the Rare Book Collection in the National Library. Find out how you can access these resources from the articles written by our reference librarians.

Do take the opportunity to visit the exhibition “Vignettes in Time: Singapore Maps and History through the Centuries” held on Level 10 of the National Library Building from 1 August to 31 October. This exhibition of more than 130 maps depicts Singapore as seen through the eyes of cartographers, geologists, mariners, military generals and town planners, and provides little-known historical snippets of Singapore. On display for the first time are many never-before-seen maps from the collections of both the National Library and Lim Shao Bin, a private map collector.

Happy reading! We look forward to receiving your comments and feedback.

Ngian Lek Choh
Director
National Library