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By Mihar Dias October 2026
The Merlion in Singapore is now breathing from an oxygen tank. Nobody has confirmed it, but nobody has denied it either, and I find that a perfectly reasonable response to the last few months. If a lion-headed fish with a fountain for a mouth is struggling, what chance has an 80-year-old like me?
I am a prisoner in my own house. The windows are sealed, the air purifier hums like a small, overworked god, and I peer through the glass at a sky the colour of weak teh tarik. Somewhere out there, I am told, float particles finer than a strand of hair. They are too small to see and too small to argue with, but quite big enough to find the way into my lungs and set up house. I am scared to death, and I do not say this lightly at my age, when death is already a regular guest at the neighbours' doors.
Meanwhile, the people who light the fires sleep soundly. The jungle burners in Indonesia, and the corporate gentlemen who pay them or look away, have taught us a new economic principle: profit is private, and the lungs are public. The plantation owner banks the money. My grandchildren inhale the invoice. Wealth over health, ledgers over lungs. It is the only truly efficient supply chain in the region, because it delivers to every household without a single delay.
Then came the finest touch of all. An Indonesian minister, with the straight face of a man reading out a menu, reminded us that in good times they sent us oxygen. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2026/10/12/we-send-oxygen-too-indonesian-officials-haze-remarks-spark-online-ridicule
Bless him for the generosity. Apparently we are now being invoiced in smoke for a kindness we did not know was on credit.
Sir, with respect, that is not how carbon credit works. Carbon credit is not a loyalty card where you collect points for sending fresh air and then redeem them by choking your neighbour. Nor is this how good neighbour policy works. A good neighbour lends you sugar. He does not lend you soot.
I am not a very religious man, but I know my scriptures. "Love thy neighbour" is in the Bible, and in the Quran, and in every decent tradition that ever taught a child to share a mango. Not one of them adds the footnote: and if convenient, send him smoke, choke his family, and cut off his oxygen supply. I have checked. I had time. I was indoors.
So let the officials hold their meetings, sign their agreements, and photograph themselves shaking hands in front of flags. We have seen this film before. The sequel is always the same: grave concern, regional cooperation, a task force, and then the rains come and everyone forgets until next year. The haze, like a bad relative, returns reliably every season, uninvited and unashamed.
As for me, I will stay in my sealed house and keep my window shut. I will watch the Merlion, tank on its back, spouting nothing but hope. And I will pray, quietly and without much faith in the budget of the relevant ministries, that those who burned for profit one day feel what the rest of us feel with every breath.
Until then, dear reader, breathe carefully. It may be the last thing the region still lets us do for free.
Mihar Dias (mihardias@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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