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"Where Have U-bin?" Storytelling at Central Public Library
- Syazwan Majid
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Hey! It's been a while since the last blog post here, several months actually. Before I go on to talk about today's topic, thought I'd do a quick update to let you guys catch up to speed on what's happened since February.
The biggest of which is: I graduated! Yup, four whole years of university completed successfully—done just like that back in July after receiving my results. It feels surreal. Although, somehow I feel I might need to make a separate post just to unpack this whole thing. Other than that, I'm also expanding on our Ambin Ubin project as well—and more on that in another separate post too, I guess. (At this point I'm just owing you guys more content, huh?)
So, let's get on to what I wanted to share for today!
So, last Friday on 22 August, I had a cosy storytelling session with some wonderful folks down at the Central Public Library. The talk was called "Where Have U-bin?" (Get it?), and it was basically a sharing of my personal and family stories on the life of an Ubin Orang Pulau. It was pretty similar to the content I had for a previous sharing, also with the National Library Board, last year as part of their Early Read Fiesta. This time, however, it was done as part of the All Things Singapore 2025 programme, in collaboration with the Singapore Night Fest celebrations this year—so there's no cartoons in this one. The theme for the programme was on islander history, and so it does seem pretty relevant and natural that I was invited once again by NLB this year to share about the island of Pulau Ubin.
There were about 20 people in attendance, all of whose presence I am thankful for! I shared with them the Legend of Pulau Ubin, as well as the 3Fs of the Ubin Orang Pulau lifestyle: Farming, Fishing and Foraging, as well as a bonus presentation on my first trip to Pulau Ubin, back when I was a wee fishball-looking Primary Two boy in 2004. That also managed to segue nicely into our Ambin Ubin project that we're working on right now—smoothly showing the progress of our stories through time.
I am pleased to learn that everybody had a wonderful time and were thoroughly engaged throughout my storytelling session, which I believe ended in about 30-40 minutes. We then had a Q&A session, which I found to be pretty robust as participants asked several interesting questions about the Ubin Orang Pulau, as well as the Ambin Ubin project. By 8pm, our hour-long session came to a close and we took a group photo at the end to capture this moment.
Looking back at that photo, I finally came to understand why people associate those with a large forehead as having a bright future, because good heavens, look at that glow-up on me ;)
My special thanks to Ashif for emceeing the session, Aqilah for liaising and taking the photo, and of course the National Library Board, for having me and allowing me this platform to share more of our Ubin Orang Pulau culture and stories with the public.
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