SPEECH BY DR VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN, MINISTER FOR COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT, YOUTH AND SPORTS, AT THE OFFICIAL OPENING OF SINGAPORE HERITAGEFEST 2009 , 15 JULY 2009, 10:00 AM AT THE TROPICS ATRIUM, SUNTEC CITY MALL



Prof Tommy Koh, Chairman of the National Heritage Board (NHB),
Mr Michael Koh, Chief Executive of NHB,
Mr Goh Kee Nguan, CEO of the Singapore Youth Olympics Games Organising Committee,
Ladies and gentlemen,

      Good morning.  Thank you for having me here today, to launch this meaningful Festival celebrating our heritage. To many Singaporeans, heritage consists of the customs and traditions passed on from our grandparents and great-grandparents. This may include our favourite foods and festivals, which give us a sense of identity and significance. Heritage is also important because it helps transmit values from one generation to the next. It enables us to appreciate why our forefathers made certain decisions in the past, how we arrived at today and how our choices will affect our future. For example, the Singapore of today is shaped by our sudden independence and the race riots in the 1960s. As a result of these historic incidents, we instinctively value peace and harmony. We place great importance on cohesion as fellow Singaporeans, regardless of race, language or religion. We are also a nation that values hard work and discipline, without which our small island nation could not have prospered.

Living In A Multi-Cultural Society
2.    As a nation located at the crossroads of trade routes, we have always been a magnet for immigrants from all nationalities and walks of life. We have been an open city. Our society draws strength from such diversity, and welcomes new people into its fold. Through the years, we have settled into a comfortable familiarity with the more common heritages in Singapore. Chinese, Malays, Indians and Eurasians eat in the same hawker centres, travel on the same roads and MRTs, and live next to each other as neighbours and friends.

3.    Globalisation in recent years has increased the numbers of newcomers to our shores. Our new neighbours may be similar in race, but bring with them their own unique cultures and perspectives, drawn from their many places of origin around the world. There will be inevitably be some discomfort and occasional misunderstandings. But reaching out to them as neighbours and fellow Singaporeans is essential. Everyone has to put in a little extra effort. Newcomers who have chosen to call Singapore their home must understand the road which Singapore has taken to get to where it is today, and understand how that has made local-born Singaporeans hardworking, practical, and sometimes kiasu. Those of us who were born and bred here must know that our grandparents and great-grandparents also lived with diversity and adversity. They accepted it, and reached out with a welcoming, helpful hand to their neighbours. Such simple graciousness and open-mindedness towards diversity are also key values of our Singaporean tribe. In getting to know each other better, we are likely to find commonalities, and forge strong and resilient bonds. Enhancing the mutual understanding, tolerance and acceptance between different groups of people in Singapore is also one of the key tasks of the National Integration Council (NIC).

4.    This year’s annual Singapore HeritageFest provides us with an excellent family-based platform to celebrate our multi-cultural heritage, and to pass it on to our children. The NHB has worked hard with its partners and our ethnic organisations to present a festival with broad-based appeal, featuring food, fashion, birth rites, weddings and traditional games, etc. The festival has also gone into the heartlands in a big way this year as it seeks to reach out to each and every Singaporean, from the young to the old.  

New Media Outreach and the Youth
5.    Recognising the reach of new media, the NHB has also rolled out some innovative online initiatives that complement the efforts of HeritageFest.  For instance, one of its social networking sites Yesterday.sg is placed 5th on the World’s Museum Blog ranking.  Not only has Yesterday.sg attracted and engaged the web-savvy, it has also reached out to the youth. Bloggers actively contribute stories on Singapore’s heritage and the NHB has also launched a new component, HTV or Heritage TV on YouTube that showcases short videos on historical places in Singapore.  The NHB also uses Facebook extensively; this morning’s opening ceremony is on Twitter with tweets going on even as we speak.

6.    The NHB’s latest foray into New Media is Mystory.sg which I am pleased to launch today.  I understand that one component of Mystory.sg encourages you to create and plan your own virtual historical and community walking trails and invite friends to join you on these trails.  It allows the sharing of stories, online conversations and networking.  Most importantly it hopes to encourage you to go beyond the virtual world and do a walk to physically discover the trail in actuality.  

New Outreach to the Silver Community
7.    NHB also wants to encourage and provide more opportunities for our seniors to share on heritage with the next generation. Hence, I am happy to announce that from today, all Singapore citizens and PRs who are aged 60 and above can visit the permanent galleries of our main NHB museums, namely the National Museum of Singapore, the Asian Civilisations Museum, the Singapore Art Museums, 8QSAM and The Peranakan Museum for free, everyday, all year round.  We hope that our senior citizens will take this opportunity to visit our museums with their children, grandchildren and friends.

Outreach Through YOG
8.    One of the benefits of having a good knowledge of our heritage is the ability to have people-to-people relations across cultures. This was proven when Singapore was bidding to host the inaugural Youth Olympic Games in 2010. One of the key selection criteria was whether the host country had a rich heritage and if there were opportunities for the young athletes to participate and learn about other cultures. I am pleased to say that Singapore’s rich multi-cultural heritage more than met this criteria. And what better platform than the Singapore HeritageFest for youth to get together, understand each other better and forge new friendships that hopefully will last for a long time. I am therefore happy to announce that the Singapore HeritageFest is a Singapore 2010 Festival Partner for the Youth Olympic Games. As a Festival Partner for the YOG, the Singapore Heritage Fest will be holding performances, exhibitions and interactive activities such as henna painting and Chinese calligraphy as part of the Culture and Education Programme at the Youth Olympic Village.

Conclusion
9.    Through this year’s theme for the Singapore HeritageFest - “Who’s Your Neighbour” - let us take the opportunity to better understand our neighbours, both old and new, and build a community that trusts and looks out for each other. Let us treasure our heritage and leave a worthwhile legacy for our children. It is now my pleasure to declare the Singapore HeritageFest 2009 open. Thank you.