Victually

A new wave of optimism is sweeping across the belt of land, overlooked by the Gryphon's Lair, which, to this very day, the management insists is a canteen. Coming in the wake of new, grandiose plans by the Headmaster to dub the eating area as a "cafeteria" (trifling structural changes being the ever faithful pretext) , recent developments have led stallholders to believe that the best years are yet past them. No doubt, of course, that I am referring to the impending move of Raffles Junior College from its present seat at Mount Sinai to a more palatable milieu set in the heart of Bishan.

On more occasions than one (read two), anxious hawkers plying their trade at Raffles Institution have eagerly sought to confirm with me the precise moment of the inauguration of the new campus. Both times, I indicated that the shift would be effected in January next, whereupon similar responses were elicited.

Making a few elementary deductions, it is evident that a peculiar mode of thinking has infiltrated the kitchens at Raffles Institution, thereby contributing to the recent festive atmosphere and it is this: The food served at Raffles Junior College is of questionable standards. The sole and indubitable reason why such concerns have managed to thrive for the last twenty years is because of a lack of viable alternatives. Therefore, when Raffles Junior College comes to the neighbourhood, bringing with it thousands of hungry adolescents, there will be an upsurge in demand for proper nourishment, which can only be obtainable from the Raffles Institution "call-it-what you-will".

In my opinion, that is not a bad line of argument, provided the college does not retain the antiquated rule barring students from stepping out of the confines of the campus before thirty minutes past noon. Then again, by that time, the definition of "campus" could have become very wide-ranging indeed.