It's Bedtime Somewhere

How did I end up here? I haven’t slept in 48 hours, and as I march to the Serangoon Road bus stop, colors have started to swirl. This whole city is painted in clashing reds and blues and yellows, between green palms and grey skies. It’s a child’s drawing.
The children nearby who blink at me, curious, do not draw. They are crouched around a tire as the toxic smoke snakes from a makeshift crucible, green and gold circuit boards melting within. Carcasses of dead computers and VCRs litter the street around them, the innards stripped of any copper that might fetch a tiny price.
It’s a sticky Sunday afternoon in Little India, and I need sleep – but the owner of my hostel has demanded I pay cash, and the machine has just malfunctioned and eaten my only credit card. The one bank in Singapore that opens on Sundays is on the other side of the island, and I have change for just three bus fares.
“Northpoint Shopping Centre?” I ask.
“Yes-yes!” the driver nods, gesturing for me to get on. I collapse into a seat.
Out the window three small boys grin like monkeys, balanced on a dirt-bike coughing black smoke behind. Colonial brickwork opens to a cricket pitch, then a temple, curled tiles and colored sculptures defying the sensible lines of the city beyond. I blink, and in an instant the city has changed.
I stare, bewildered, at my wristwatch. Did I just sleep? I dig a crumpled map from my jacket. I am nowhere near Northpoint Shopping Centre. I get off, and cross the road.
“Northpoint Shopping Centre?” I demand, jabbing at it on my map.
“Yes-yes!” the next driver grins, waving me on, impatient.
This time I watch the route carefully, frowning as skyscrapers rise around us.
“Northpoint Shopping Centre?” I insist, holding the map right up to the driver’s face.
“Yes-yes!” he says, shaking his head. I get off to see people rushing indoors. The sky has turned dark, and a curtain of torrential rain descends, soaking me through in seconds.
“Northpoint Shopping Centre?” I croak, dripping.
He nods. I stand by his side the whole way, until he stops outside a concrete monolith and points triumphantly at the name emblazoned on its side. The bank teller accepts that the bright, optimistic face on the passport could well be the same bedraggled one before her, and I return with my cash.
As my head touches the pillow, I listen as the call to prayer echoes from a mosque nearby, and think of those children, wreathed in poison smoke. I wonder if they’ll see the inside of a cash machine?