Time.com, 13 Mar 2009, Neel Chowdhury
On the northern fringe of Singapore, overlooking the slate-gray waters of the Johor Straits, the public-housing estate where Anthony Fulwood lives is so far from the city's affluent expatriate enclaves that cab drivers are stunned when he announces his address. "'For god's sake, why do you live there?' they regularly ask me," says Fulwood. "'You're white!'"
Fulwood isn't the only Western expatriate who's taken up residence in the cheaper peripheries of this Southeast Asian city. An English teacher and community volunteer whose duties include helping integrate Westerners into the Bukit Panjang neighborhood, the 30-year-old Englishman sees a small but steadily growing number of Americans, Australians and Europeans in the tube-lit coffee shop where locals often gather after work around cold pitchers of beer. These foreigners are economic refugees, of a sort. Due to the global recession, expat bankers, traders and corporate managers have lost their high-paying jobs with multinational corporations. But instead of returning to their home countries, they've decided to stay in Asia, even though it means moving to cheaper housing and giving up privileges that once set them apart from ordinary Singaporeans. (Read TIME's cover story on expats in Singapore.)
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