Only idiots take the wrong trains. It is wonderfully tidy, and after a week of it, just a bit oppressive, too. And the architect of it all is Mr Lee. Late on a humid Friday afternoon, my taxi inches into the sumptuous golf course grounds of the Presidential Palace. Guards beckon us up the hill to the white official building where the senior minister has his office.
Tea is offered.
With this background, it is easy to see how Mr Lee devised his plans for his city state when in 1965, after six years of independence, the Malaysian Confederation fell apart. The island of just over two million people was left on its own - independent but isolated in the middle of South East Asia. Israel provided the model, surrounded as it was by hostile Arab states. Prosperous It is also one of the most prosperous countries on Earth. But perhaps it's now time for this workaholic, shop-aholic nation to change its nature once again.