Singapore Marina Barrage and Feng Shui

Marina Reservoir

There is most probably 17 Reservoirs in Singapore and the Marina Barrage which is a basically just but a Dam, is also known as the Marina Reservoir is the 15th Reservoir.



It is at the same time the 1st reservoir in the inside of a main city. From the flyer of Singapore, tourists and visitors can get to have a good view of the marina barrage. Together with reservoirs at Punggol and Serangoon, this Barrage will increase Singapore's water catchment from half to two-thirds of Singapore's total land area.

Marina Barrage

This Barrage serves the purpose of keeping seawater out and to help alleviate the flooding of low lying areas such Chinatown, Jalan Besar and Geylang. However, it somewhat seems that the flooding has turn to Orchard and Bukit timah area.

Despite that, this Barrage was conferred the superior achievement award , which is the highest honour of the competition for the best project entry at the AAEE (American Academy of Environmental Engineers) Annual awards Luncheon which was held in washington DC of USA the year of 2009, 6th of may. The project itself for this barrage is a S$226 million ( USD$172,117,011) project aiming to provide water supply, flood control and new lifestyle attractions by the waters, amazingly.

In the Amazing Race 16, the Singapore Marina Barrage was the 9th pit stop as part of leg 9.


Feng Shui is the Number 9




However, the barrage is built according to Feng shui design just like the marina bay sands, suntec city and many other more.

The feng shui of it is built to resemble the number 9

The number 9 according to the Chinese as well as to many other religons is definately a good number, an auspicious number.


To the Chinese



According to history, the number 9 (九,jiŭ) was associated with the Emperor of China and very frequently, this number was used in matters in relations to the Chinese Emperor.

The number “9” has a special philosophical meaning, because the heaven is “Yang” or masculine while the earth is “Yin” or feminine. “Yang” is represented by an odd number of the figures from 1 to 9.

It implies reverence for heaven which is most lofty. Therefore, number “nine” has a deep philosophical meaning. It hints something rational. And emperors who called himself the son of heaven would naturally offer sacrifices to heaven and communicate with heaven in a world composed of the nines.



Therefore some people said that the Circular Mound Altar include endless numbers. For instance, the area of the up tiers of the Circular Mound Altar is 9 “Zhang” in diameter. The total number of the diameters of the three tiers of the Circular Mound Altar is 45 “Zhang”, which not only is the multiple of 9, but also symbolizes the supreme position of the emperor and the heaven.



The Robe of the Emperor had nine dragons and according to the Chinese mythology, it has been said that the dragon had 9 children.

The imperial examination officials were structured in the nine rank system and that the nine bestowment were of rewards by the Emperors for the officials of extraordinary capacity and loyalty. The nine familial exterminations (灭九族) were one of the harshest punishments that the Emperor can sentence.

In Feng Shui, nine sections are cordoned off by agricultural land owners; eight sections of land are cultivated, but the ninth section (in the center of the agricultural blueprint) is classified as "god's acre" and is devoted to honor the supreme and sacred.



9 is a jackpot of celestial forces to the Chinese. It means completion and satisfaction. It is a representation of high celestial congruence standard. 9 in the Chinese zodiac is the symbol of the Monkey and the Feng Shui direction is West/Southwest.

The number 9 also symbolizes harmony. In addition, the number 9 is a word for "longlasting" (久), and is often used in weddings. Nine is a sacred number; three multiplied by itself to give eternity, completion and fulfilment.



In China, number 9 is the number of celestial power, the nine storeyed pagoda is a symbol of heaven.

To the West and other Religions

Nine represents attainment, satisfaction, accomplishment, and our success to achieve an influence in our circumstances. The spiritual meaning of number Nine deals with intellectual power inventiveness, influence over situations and things. Nine beseeches us to recognize our own internal attributes, and extend these abilities out into the world to make a positive, influential difference.

Nine is the number of the one who accomplishes the divine will. According to the Cabal, it is also the number of the achievement.



Many folk saying around the number 9 like : A stitch in time saves nine; Cloud nine is the ultimate happiness.; A cat has nine lives.

A nine pointed star is used by the Bahai as a symbol faith. The number nine has significance in the Bahá'í Revelation. Nine years after the announcement of the Báb in Shiraz, Bahá'u'lláh received the intimation of His mission in the dungeon in Teheran. Nine, as the highest single-digit number, symbolizes completeness.
Since the Bahá'í Faith claims to be the fulfillment of the expectations of all prior religions, this symbol, as used for example in nine-sided Bahá'í temples, reflects that sense of fulfillment and completeness

The Nine Pointed Star

Multiplying by nine reveals a mirror symmetry among numbers. If any number is multiplied by nine the resulting digits always add to nine. For example 2 x 9 = 18; 3 x 9 = 27, 4 x 9 = 36 and so on. Thus, the Hebrews referred to nine as the symbol of immutable Truth.

The Ennead, or nine pointed star, is an ancient and sacred symbol. It comprises three trinities. The Egyptian, Celtic, Greek and Christian myths all have an ennead of nine gods and goddesses, representing the entire archetypal range of principles.

The magic square is also considered sacred and full of power in the Islamic, Tibetan, Buddhist, Celtic, Indian and Jewish traditions. A magic square is when each number is used only once, but the horizontal, vertical and diagonal sums are all equal. The Chinese have patterned their architectural temples along the harmonious principles of the magic square.

Chinese Feng Shui of the Marina Barrage

However, are you aware that this Barrage is not as simple as it seems to be? There is once again some Chinese Feng Shui elements to it. As to is it for the good or bad, that I will leave it to you.

The below is an abstract of one of the Feng shui Master

This article is by Master Tan Koon Yong of Wayonnet:



On 23 December 2008, two days before the arrival of Christmas, the Singapore Flyer came to a halt for the third time since it became operational in February. In this unexpected incident, 173 people were trapped in the world’s largest observation wheel for about 6 hours. The cease of operation of the Flyer not only dampened the spirits of those who had planned to visit the attraction on the Christmas or New Year’s Day, it also affected the business of the shops, causing them to suffer huge losses due to the decrease in the number of visitors. After more than a month of waiting, the Flyer finally re-opened on 26 January 2009.



Two months later, another misfortune occurred at Marina Bay. The iconic Merlion statue was struck by lightning on 28 February 2009, a date that is still fresh in the memories of many people. This shocking accident occurred around 4.30pm and caused the 36-year-old statue to lose a part of its top mane. Many feng shui masters commented that this incident will bring wealth but Grand Master Tan disagrees. In his opinion, Singapore might experience further difficulties on the economic front.



Within such a short time span, the two important tourist attractions of Singapore encountered mishaps. Coincidentally, both accidents occurred after the Marina Barrage was completed. Is there any connection between these events?



According to Grand Master Tan, Singapore is a “Dragon Land” and the Marina Bay area resembles a “Dragon Head” from the top. The region around Benjamin Sheares Bridge alludes to the whiskers of the “Dragon”, forming a unique feng shui formation of “Mighty Dragon Emerging from the Ocean”. However, due to the completion of the Marina Barrage, it may be regarded that the mouth of the “Mighty Dragon” is being sealed, resulting in “static” reservoir water bodies as opposed to the original “live” water bodies. The sealed mouth has caused the qi of the area to be suppressed within the reservoir, thus causing the occurrence of the various unfortunate incidents.



In Grand Master’s opinion, he suggests that Marina Barrage builds a water-jet at the mouth of the reservoir. During his trip to Switzerland, Grand Master went to the Jet d’Eau in Geneva, which is one of the largest fountains in the world. He observed the magnificent scene of the powerful water-jet, and deeply feels that Singapore’s Marina Barrage will need a water-jet like that of Geneva’s. With a huge water-jet at the mouth of the reservoir at Marina Barrage, the powerful movement of the fountain would be able to reverse the luck of Singapore by turning “static” water bodies into “live” water bodies. The water-jet will not only solve the feng shui problems of Singapore, it will also become another eye-catching scene for those on board the Singapore Flyer.

9 for the Marian Barrage Means

Hence, by building this barrage to resemble the number 9, it is to suppose to symbolize the longivity of the nation of Singapore and ever long lasting to the wealth of a prosperous Singapore. Don't forget after all that water is money! Wealth, money and income or finance is being represented by water according to the chinese where Feng Shui is of concern.

So, is the Singapore Marina Barrage design and architecture which is being build and base according to Feng Shui done correct or wrong?

That , I will leave the conclusion to you.

Is a Barrage Benificial ? 

However, there are people who has different views which non feng shui about the building of a barrage.

The below will be one of the many abstracts by a politican in Singapore

UPDATE : I did a quick check on the Internet and found that the construction of barrages around the world to prevent or control flooding very often leads to increased flooding as an unintended consequence[Check for yourself here]. The reason is water flow (fluid dynamics) is highly complex and is often not amendable to analysis. One hint that something has gone wrong is areas that don't normally flood starts flooding (think Orchard Road). When the big flood in Orchard Road first occurred, the PUB quickly put out a statement that it was caused by debris and would be worse if the Marina Barrage was not there. Now that we have 3(?) other floods since then and floods recurring at Orchard Road at much lower rainfall than the earlier one, I think it is time for them to check all the possibilities not just the ones that absolve the govt from blame and conveniently lead to conclusions that nothing needs to be done

Netizens and ordinary Singaporeans do not have the data or expertise to rigorously prove this hypothesis. Only the govt and its experts can come up with rigorous explanations. I highlighted this popular hypothesis only to show the need for the govt to step forward and explain what is going on. The public generally don't accept "once in 50 years" and "debris in the drain" type of convenient (convenient for the govt to do nothing) explanations which now look rather ridicious given the frequency of these floods.

Some other flooding incidents associated with building of barrages in other countries:



In Kuching : http://anilnetto.com/development-issues/floods-in-kuching/
The Malaysian govt denied it because it was the one that build the barrage.



An official report by the Dutch Government found the construction of a storm surge barrier across the Oosterschelde estuary in the 1980s actually increased the risk of flooding in the area.[Link].

Sources :

http://singaporemind.blogspot.com/2010/07/marina-barage-and-floods.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_in_Chinese_culture

http://www.whats-your-sign.com/chinese-meaning-of-numbers.html

http://www.whats-your-sign.com/spiritual-meaning-of-numbers.html

http://www.chinaculture.org/chineseway/2007-12/10/content_124562.htm

http://www.ridingthebeast.com/numbers/nu9.php

http://mmdelrosario.hubpages.com/hub/numbers

http://www.greatdreams.com/nine/nine.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina_Barrage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina_Reservoir

http://nonpresidentscholar.wordpress.com/

http://www.sammyboy.com/showthread.php?23624-Marina-bay-now-bad-fengshui