The Singapore skyline shimmered in the early morning haze. Sarah turned up the air conditioning in the car, then glanced up and looked out the windscreen as Dan steered the car along the busy highway. She checked the map laid out open on her lap and pointed left.
‘Here,’ she said. ‘This is Keppel Harbour. The entrance to the docks should be about a mile down here on the left.’
Sarah studied the map. ‘Look out for a sign to Pasir Panjang. I spoke to a guy at the freight company before we left Brisbane – he said it would have probably been unloaded there.’
Dan slowed the car and made the turn. ‘Have you thought about how we’re going to get through the gates?’ he asked. ‘I’m presuming it’s going to be guarded.’
Sarah rummaged in her bag and held up an identity card.
‘Press identification. I’ll tell them I’m running a story on the shipping port for a travel magazine or something. Hopefully they won’t ask too many questions.’
Dan slowed as the entrance to the docks came into view.
‘There’s the sign for the terminal,’ said Sarah, pointing to her left.
A small, stocky man leaned out of a small cinderblock guard house, saw the car approaching and stepped out next to the horizontal red and white striped barrier blocking their way. He motioned to Dan to stop.
Dan wound the window down and slowed the car to a halt, leaned his elbow on the window frame and tried his best to look nonchalant.
‘Help you?’ asked the guard. Not friendly. Not helpful. Just doing the same job, day after day.
Sarah leaned over Dan and smiled up at the guard as she flashed her press identity card at him. ‘Hi! I’m from the UK. I’m writing an article about the shipping port for a magazine for cruise passengers. My editor should’ve phoned ahead.’
The guard inclined his head and grunted. Thought about it. ‘And him?’ he asked, pointing at Dan.
‘I’m the photographer,’ grinned Dan. ‘We should get some great shots this evening with that sunset.’
The guard nodded. ‘Wait here.’ He returned to the guard house. The barrier stayed down.
‘What’s he doing?’ whispered Sarah.
‘Probably looking for a record of when your ‘editor’ phoned.’
They could see the guard through the window of his concrete and corrugated iron roof hut. His head was down. The tops of pages could be seen as they flickered in and out of view as he went through a register. Eventually he glanced up. He looked out the window straight at Dan and Sarah as they sat in the car, hopeful expressions on their faces. Dan smiled and raised his hand at the guard.
‘What’s going on?’ said Sarah. ‘Is he going to let us in do you think?’
‘No idea,’ murmured Dan as the guard came back out of the guard house and began walking back towards the car.
He frowned, carrying a clipboard. ‘When did you say your editor called?’ he asked.
‘I didn’t,’ said Sarah, still smiling, ‘but I think it was last week some time. I really don’t know – I was too busy trying to book a last-minute flight.’
The guard straightened up and looked beyond the barrier to the docks ahead. Dan and Sarah followed his gaze. They were tantalisingly close.
The guard seemed to make a decision. Perhaps he didn’t want to be mentioned in the article as being an example of over-zealous bureaucrats; perhaps it was just the end of his shift. He bent down to Dan’s open window again and thrust the clipboard at him.
‘Okay. You both sign here.’
Dan took the register and wrote his name as illegibly as he could before passing it across to Sarah. He motioned to her to do the same. She took the hint, scrawled across the next space on the register and handed it back. Dan passed it through the window to the guard.
The ceremony complete, the guard took the clipboard and frowned momentarily at the two entries. He paused, thought about asking the two people to re-sign, then changed his mind. The shift change was in less than an hour and he really didn’t care – he didn’t get paid enough to make sure visitors’ calligraphy skills were above average.
‘Go through when I raise the barrier,’ he instructed and walked away.
Dan breathed out while he wound the car window up. Sarah could hardly contain her excitement.
‘We did it – we’re in!’ she exclaimed.
‘Yeah, well, calm down otherwise he’s going to wonder why on earth you’re so excited about your magazine assignment and we’ll end up getting pulled over.’ Dan watched as the barrier was raised and drove slowly through. No point in rushing.
Sarah bit her lip and held her breath until they were past the guard house and under the barrier, then began to punch the air. ‘Yes! Now let’s find that container!’
Dan steered the car carefully over the pock-marked bitumen. The sun was beginning to set and it was becoming difficult to see in the fading light. He found the unfamiliar switch for the headlights. The beam caught signs for various docks, pointing in different directions. He risked a glance to his right at a huge freighter being unloaded under floodlights. An enormous crane picked up each container as if it was a matchbox then set it on a flat-bed truck waiting patiently below. Dan slowed and turned his head to see a procession of trucks lined up along the length of the dock, all waiting their turn.
‘How big is this place?’ exclaimed Sarah.
‘It’s huge,’ said Dan. ‘Well over half the world’s shipping comes through here.’
Sarah pointed to a sign displayed on a post at a junction in the road. ‘There – follow that road.’
Dan drove slowly down a wide concrete path and pulled the car up behind a container. ‘Here goes,’ he said, and climbed out.