Old And New

Going to the National Archives never fails to depress me a little. It doesn't have much to do with the Archives, but the fact that the old National Library isn't there anymore.

I remember during my uni days I would go to the National Library every so often to do research. It wasn't so much that it was better, but that I preferred the old red brick building. It felt like what a library should feel like, with the smell of the books sunk into the very walls of the place. Now that there's a gaping tunnel where it used to be, I can't recognize the place anymore. Well, that and the fact that there's a spanking new university in the area. Come on man, you can't be a uni kid without making the journey to the West. What's this city campus nonsense? Ah, those were the days. Hell, if SMU was around when I was applying to uni, I probably would've gone there, just because of the location.

I digress. The National Archives is a very strange mix of the old and new. The building, thankfully, isn't new and doesn't feature all that funky glass that all new buildings love. But the tech inside is very up to date. Searching through the archives isn't as painful as it sounds, though it still takes some finagling to get the info you want. Andrew confessed that one of the main reasons he got me to be the producer has to do with the fact that I'm good at research and he isn't. Gee, thanks, boss. I suppose in a way, I'm responsible for that; we used to take a lot of the same classes, and usually did project work together, so while I did the research, he did the execution, be it writing the paper, editing the film, or drawing up the storyboards.Even when we weren't taking the same class, he'd occasionally bribe me with baked goods to get me to find stuff for him.

Well, all that training helped. I managed to find some 16mm films from WWII days. It's unbelievable footage, of the Japanese invading from across the Causeway, that sort of thing. Whoever shot that must've had balls of titanium. Andrew was so ridiculously happy about it he actually picked me up and swung me around. At 1.69m tall and single, I am not accustomed to being picked up, much less swung around. I also found some old photos of Old Changi Hospital, or OCH, as we've taken to calling it. He's going to weave that all into the documentary, to add more credence to it. Important, since we're really going with the haunted angle. -_-