Bras Basah Complex’s Knowledge Book Centre

A mainstay of Bras Basah Complex for the past four decades is closing by mid-July.

Knowledge Book Centre, which has been operating at Bras Basah Complex since it was set up in 1981, is set to close down, hurt by rental expenses and declining business.

It will be moving out after the landlord finds a tenant to take over the 1,200 sq ft space - about the size of a five-room HDB flat - on the third floor.

“It has been a struggle to pay rent. One or two months of struggling to pay rent is okay, but how long can I push through? At my age, I also don’t want to be stressed,” said Mr Mohamed Ismail, 69, who runs the outlet and is a part-owner.

Knowledge Book Centre sells mainly second-hand books and is known for its educational materials from primary to tertiary levels.

The business was started by his uncle, Mr Mohamed Syed, now 85, in 1975 with two partners. The first location was in Bras Basah Road and under a different name.

Mr Ismail worked in his uncle’s business from 1981 to 1984 before he took on a job in Saudi Arabia.

At his uncle’s behest, he returned and started working at Knowledge Book Centre in December 1997. His uncle made him a partner in 2000 after one of the original partners died and the other wanted out.

Mr Syed, who retired in 2010, remains a partner and shows up at the store from time to time.

Although it initially sold new books, Knowledge Book Centre started buying and selling second-hand titles in 2000. Today, Mr Ismail estimates that 80 per cent of his business comes from used books.

In its heyday in the late 1990s, he said the store had 10 employees and was making around $40,000 a month.

These days, monthly sales have dropped to around $15,000 over the past seven to eight months, barely enough to cover the monthly rental of $7,500 after other expenses like utility bills.

The rent was previously $8,500 until the landlord decreased it last year because of the pandemic.

“If people come and business is okay, I won’t close the shop, but no one is coming,” Mr Ismail said, adding that footfall had been particularly low in recent months, although he is unsure of the reason…

The bookstore’s first appearance in the newspapers, on 19 November 1982. Credit: SPH Media Trust.

I visited the bookstore for the last time to record it for posterity.

It was everything I imagined a bookstore I would own - an organised chaos, with books spilling out of shelves and onto the floor.

There were also the dated fonts, metal grilles, worn-out linoleum flooring, fake ceiling boards, and old wall clock one would never find in newer, flashier bookstores.

Some shelf labels were for show only; the books did not match these labels, so I had to look at every shelf if I wanted to unearth a second-hand gem - which I did, several times.

The last day of the bookstore is 15 July.

The hexagons of Tanglin Halt Food Centre

We had lunch at Tanglin Halt Food Centre in Tanglin Halt Estate. I took the chance to take photos of the place, because it was closing for good on 31 July, and moving to nearby Margaret Drive Hawker Centre.

The food centre was shutting down as part of the general winding down of Tanglin Halt, as most of the estate awaits the wrecking ball under the Selective En bloc Redevelopment Scheme (Sers).

Tanglin Halt Food Centre, also known as Commonwealth Drive Food Centre, is almost as old as Tanglin Halt itself, which was built in the 1960s. It is not to be confused with Tanglin Halt Market, which lies across Tanglin Halt Road.

Below is the 1978 street directory showing the market and the food centre in Tanglin Halt Estate.

What stands out for the food centre is its architecture - three hexagons joined like honeycomb cells of a beehive, hence the curious situation of the food centre possessing three addresses - Blocks 1A, 2A, and 3A. An allusion to Tanglin Halt residents being as hardworking as bees, perhaps? I jest.

The three hexagons of Tanglin Halt Food Centre. Tanglin Halt Market is to the left. Credit: Google Maps.

Depending on which stall you are at in the food centre, the address may vary.

After lunch, I walked around the food centre, taking in the architecture, the high ceiling, the shuttered stalls and empty tables and chairs, the background buzz common to community spaces, the laziness of a hot, dusty, early afternoon.

Some stalls, such as dessert and Hakka thunder tea rice, were still doing a brisk business.

The community plaza next to the food centre, just 12 years old and covered with a tasteful wooden deck, will go too. It was cordoned off pending demolition.

As for Tanglin Halt Market, it will be torn down in 2024.

Curtains on Cathay Cineplex

Paid a visit to Cathay Cineplex, because it is shutting for good tomorrow, 26 June, after 16 years in The Cathay at 2 Handy Road.

Media company mm2 Asia, which acquired Cathay’s cineplexes in Singapore in 2017, said the decision to close Cathay Cineplex was a business one, part of “cost rationalisation for its cinema operations”.

In simple English - the cineplex business in Singapore is bleeding money.

Actually, the cinematic lineage of Cathay Cineplex goes back further, more than eight decades to 1939, when Cathay Cinema opened in the Cathay Building. At the time, Cathay Building was the tallest building not just in Singapore, but all of Southeast Asia; Cathay Cinema was Singapore’s first air-conditioned theatre.

Cathay Building. Credit: Courtesy of National Archives of Singapore.

Cathay Cinema operated from 1939 to 1942, and from 1946 to 2000, the only break happening because of the Japanese Occupation. From 2000 to 2006, Cathay Building and Cathay Cinema were redeveloped into The Cathay and Cathay Cineplex; only the iconic facade of the cinema was conserved.

Cathay Cinema in 1953. Credit: SPH Media Trust.

The name of the building was derived from the name of the cinema or cineplex. The Cathay won’t be the same after Cathay Cineplex is gone.

When I was younger and watched more movies, I frequented the cineplexes in the Orchard area - Lido Cineplex at Shaw House, Cathay Cineleisure Orchard, and Cathay Cineplex at The Cathay. Another landmark from my younger days will cease to be.

The large TV screen near the box office showing the latest trailers.

The box office.

The escalators to the floor above, where the halls were.

The entrance to the halls.

The tenants of The Cathay don’t seem to be doing very well. Expect more black dashes to appear on the tenant list in the months to come.