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Day 2

The day began with a mild sense of excitement. The President of Singapore was to arrive at the show to take part in the Opening Ceremony. His arrival was preceded by a troop of hand drummers in ceremonial dress before the President accompanied by his Minister, Mr Tay (President of the FIAP) and Mr Tan among others. Click here to view the video. A traditional dance was performed on stage, before the light hearted and slightly cheesy official opening. Each VIP placed “stamps” on to the envelope printed on the back wall before the President cancelled the stamps with an explosion of confetti. I couldn’t stop smiling as I watched on. His walk around the show concluded with a visit to the Court of Honour but unfortunately the mass of people around him didn’t direct him our way.

Excitement over, the day was indeed busier than the day before. I’m not sure what was going on in the stage area, but lots of screaming children and bagpipes was an unusual concoction on the ears… More VIPs were out in force with several turning up to our launch of Pradip Jain’s book about the 1948 Gandhi issue which we were pleased to edit and publish. Nothing as fancy as Spink’s launch of a banknote book later that day but our more intimate scenario was well received. The day dragged on somewhat and my feet were aching by the time the show closed at 8pm.

 

Gandhi Memorial Issue by Pradip Jain book launch

Day 3
On the third day, I decided to leave the security to the guard permanently patrolling the court of honour to explore the collections on display. I had already studied the court of honour intently in order to pass the time. The most striking was 2 frames of China Red Revenues. A fellow philatelist was kind enough to give David a copy of the owner’s collection which seems to include all the major items including the small $1 surcharge in a block of four which is a multi-million dollar item, but unfortunately (and understandably) it wasn’t on display here. Also on display was selected rarities from Selangor from the Sultan himself, as well as several collections and individual rarities from previous Grand Prix winners.
The competitive exhibits were somewhat daunting. At previous shows the frames had been split up and spread throughout the venue. At Singapore 2015 they were all amassed at one end of this giant exhibition hall. Speaking with the person in charge of the logistics of the exhibition was illuminating; they had had to borrow exhibition frames from all over Asia to be able to show all the exhibits submitted, noticeable by the fact that there was at least 3 different styles of frame. Slightly worrying was the noticeable affect of the humidity on the exhibits: paper was warping and mounts were becoming unstuck.