Noorul Hayath adjusting his gasing as it spins during a game at the Kolam Ayer Gasing & Games Court on Jan 5. - ST/ANN
SINGAPORE: Hidden in plain sight in the Geylang Baru heartland is a sheltered, caged structure, with passers-by barely noticing its existence.
But around once a week, the Kolam Ayer Gasing & Games Court comes alive when five men, aged 60 to 79, show up. The seniors are among the nation’s last players of a kampung game: gasing, or spinning tops.
Players use a thin piece of rope or string to launch the heavy, round wooden top. A successful launch gets the top landing on the ground and spinning continuously.
In one of two forms of competitive gasing, players battle it out to see whose top spins the longest as the “last man standing”.
In the other competitive format, the players of one team will defend their spinning tops. The other team of strikers will use their tops to knock out their opponents’ tops.
The spinning top has ancient roots as an object of play: One was reportedly found in the tomb of Egyptian monarch Tutankhamun, who lived during the 14th century BC.
But gasing seems to be unique to the Malay Peninsula.
Koh Nai Tiam, 79, says he learnt how to play the game during his childhood kampung days in Malaysia. His family moved to Singapore in 1953.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, efforts were made in Singapore to keep the game alive, giving the former painter and cleaner an opportunity to revisit his youthful pastime.
According to an article published in The Straits Times in 1981, the first step towards reviving gasing for both exhibition matches and tournaments was the formation of the Singapore Gasing Federation (Fedegasi) in 1979 by a number of gasing enthusiasts.
An early move by the Fedegasi was the installation of gasing courts in Eunos Crescent and Clementi. Those have since closed down.
The court in Geylang Bahru was installed in 1983, before moving around the neighbourhood and in 1998 finally settling in its current spot – in the middle of Blocks 63 to 67 Kallang Bahru. It is a stone’s throw from Geylang Bahru Market & Food Centre.
Noorul Hayath, 65, picked up the sport in the early 1980s, although he had played with similar spinning tops during his own kampung childhood.
“A friend invited me to try out the game. It took me just a week or two to learn how to play gasing, since I had played with such tops while growing up,” the air cargo handler tells ST.
Gasing is not easy to pick up. The top, which weighs around 800g and has a circumference of around 40cm, requires finesse in the wrist action used to launch it – and then speed when pulling the rope away from the top, so it will enter its own orbit.
Competitive gasing ups the difficulty level, as the gasing must land in one specific circle, which has a diameter of about 1m.
Both Koh and Noorul are such skilled players that they can target even specific quadrants of this circle to land their tops in.
The players still make their spinning gasing in the work shed at the back of the court, which is usually kept locked by the Jalan Besar Town Council.
These days, though, they purchase the tops used for striking from Malaysia or Indonesia for around S$80 (US$62) a piece. Both varieties of gasing are made of wood pulp.
“The one used for striking contains extra metal to make it more durable,” says Koh.
Members of the group also use their own money and labour to put the finishing touches to the court, including its wooden planks. These are dotted and scarred from the tops – evidence of the many hours of practice and play the men have put into the game.
They show off their hard-earned skills at gasing competitions in Malaysia, where the game is popular enough that many states have their own teams.
“The Malaysian teams have younger players,” Noorul notes. “But we have been doing quite well considering our members are older.”
Most of these competitions have a nominal participation fee of RM100 to RM200, which the players bear themselves, along with transport, accommodation and food costs. The team won first place in the MyGasing championship in 2014 and 2022, held in the cities of Klang and Kuala Lumpur respectively.
And they are hoping to pass their love of the game to others in Singapore.
On Jan 10 and 24, the group will host gasing demonstrations and hands-on sessions at the court in hopes of inculcating interest in the game among younger people. At the very least, they figure, people will realise the forgotten game exists.
“I’m very excited and keen to teach people who are interested in the game,” says Koh. “It’s a part of Singapore heritage and history, so we should try to keep it alive.”
Gasing Demonstration & Hands-on
Where: Kolam Ayer Gasing & Games Court, in the middle of Blocks 63 to 67 Kallang Bahru
When: Jan 10 and 24, 3.30 to 5pm
Admission: Free with registration, go to linktr.ee/gasingsdemo - The Straits Times/ANN
