Japanese YouTuber visits 'dangerous' Yishun, only to find it a 'nice cozy town'

Yishun’s reputation as a siao lang town has reached far and wide enough to attract the attention of one Japanese vlogger who is well aware of the northern precinct's infamy in local lore. 

But the story of the YouTuber himself, Ghibli Ojisan, is interesting. Born in Osaka, raised in the United States, and currently based in Singapore, the man travels the world to busk and films his experiences for his YouTube channel, which already has over 102,000 subscribers. 

Aside from having a Bangladeshi buddy he got to know in Singapore, Ghibli likes to travel to the little-known neighbourhoods that normcore tourists wouldn’t visit. Like Sengkang and Yishun, for example. 

Though Yishun’s so-called disrepute is very much an Internet-derived joke that has blown out of proportion, Ghibli noted that Yishun is the country’s “most dangerous area” where cat-killings, drug deals, murders, and bizarre happenings are frequent. 

But as he soon figured out, the most dangerous thing in Yishun during his visit is eating too much fried food from the stalls at a pasar malam set up next to the MRT station. Besides that, what he found were helpful residents, great roast duck rice, beautiful temples, and very alive stray cats. 

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOO7A33Uql8[/embed]

“I wanted to ask the locals if Yishun is really dangerous. I asked myself ‘Isn’t this a disrespectful question?’” he laughed, expressing his wish to return to the “nice” neighbourhood. 

“Incidents may occur but it’s Singapore after all. Very, very safe… I think”. 

In the comments section, Singaporeans reassured him that Yishun is very much okay, and not as savage as the Internet might make it out to be. 

ilyas@asiaone.com