“The HDB sort of ongoing government project is rare in India, where cities grow more organically, and affordable housing is often the last priority,” said Mr Chakrabarti, now 44.

In 2006, he was part of a team in Surbana International, Singapore, which designed an affordable mass housing project for India. Funded by the local government in Kolkata’s New Town, then an upcoming suburb, the 81ha project (pictured below), which accommodates 20,000 low and middle-income families, remains one of his proudest achievements.

“I learnt how to meticulously integrate sustainability in urban design from the conceptual stage to project completion,” he said, extolling the use of affordable, eco-friendly and long-lasting materials and features such as open courtyards, green cover and recreational spaces that are often ignored in public housing projects in India.

“It was eye-opening. I carry those learnings into every building I design today,” he told The Straits Times in a video call.

Mr Chakrabarti is now working on a residential project for a major Indian steel conglomerate, where he incorporates ideas gleaned from Singapore, such as having community gardens and public markets.

He said he enjoys making affordable housing which is much needed in India, and it is also one of his strengths.

His design has other influences too, from Indian to western. But Singapore’s blend of diverse ethnicities and traditions “profoundly influenced my approach to urban planning and design”.

He found Singapore’s public spaces such as Gardens by the Bay and East Coast Park “amazingly inclusive”, as they encouraged social interaction and community activities.

He was also inspired by vibrant hawker centres and Singapore’s celebration of all ethnic festivals, and wanted to create welcoming spaces in India that embrace diversity and social harmony.

In subsequent years, when he visited Singapore, he noticed more greenery everywhere.

He was gobsmacked by the “hotel in a garden” concept of Parkroyal Collection Pickering, which uses solar power and rain sensors and practises water conservation. He picked up tips on the energy efficiency of double-glazed and low-emissivity glass from the curved condominium towers of Reflections at Keppel Bay.

He also saw the marriage of cost-cutting and comfort in the healthcare facility in the middle floors of the Kampung Admiralty integrated development, whose inner courtyard keeps the place cool even without air-conditioning.

Singapore was the first country to make it mandatory by legislation for new buildings with a gross floor area of 5,000 sq m or more to achieve a minimum green certification.

Mr Chakrabarti began to incorporate environment-friendly concepts into his designs too. This led to projects like a sustainable all-steel data centre in Bengaluru, a green information technology park and an upcoming project experimenting with making walls using PUF panels, which reduce energy consumption for heating or cooling.

He now lives in Kolkata in eastern India. Every day, the bustling metropolis reminds him that the Singaporean vision can’t simply be transplanted there.

“Singapore’s green building designs are suited for its tropical climate, but India’s diverse weather conditions pose a challenge. Green roofs and facades require different maintenance strategies in regions with extreme heat, heavy rainfall or a cold climate,” said the architect, who is also a guest lecturer at many universities.

Other challenges he faces include India’s complex and varied building codes and time-consuming approvals. He has also struggled to ensure the steady supply of advanced materials in remote areas, find professionals trained in the latest technologies, and most of all, educate price-conscious developers on the long-term benefits of green buildings.

“India has a long way to go, but there is growing awareness that green buildings are not only a necessity to battle climate change, but they are also more durable and affordable,” he said.

“In South Korea, we have samgyetang (ginseng chicken soup) and baeksuk (chicken soup boiled with ginger and onion) and the meat is always tough and chewy. But with Hainanese chicken rice, I was shocked at how tender and juicy the meat was, (and) the rice was so flavourful!”

He scored two wins that trip – the green light to marry Ms Venny, who goes by one name, and a business idea.

They had met through mutual friends only in June 2023, but by July, spurred by their common love for food, music and tattoos, Mr Jung had proposed.

Ms Venny was then studying the Korean language in Seoul, where she has lived for the past few years.

The couple got married in March 2024 and embarked on their passion project of Hawker Boy, a Singapore-style fusion restaurant, in the Hongdae district of Seoul two months later in May.

Mr Jung, who trained in Western cooking in South Korea before working stints in Australia and France, had been planning to start either a bistro or an izakaya (a Japanese pub).

But tasting chicken rice changed his mind, and he was determined to introduce the dish to his fellow South Koreans instead, despite naysayers.

“They all said I was taking a really big risk because Singapore food is such a niche market, and it would be difficult to be economically viable. But if we do succeed, then there will be high returns too,” he told The Straits Times.

Singapore-style chicken rice can be found in at least five eateries in Seoul.

Ms Venny, who lived in Singapore briefly as a child and now visits her Singapore-based family every year, taste-tests Mr Jung’s cooking to ensure its authenticity.

Their chicken gravy underwent six iterations before they were both satisfied with the results.

But replicating the authentic taste of Singapore’s chicken rice is not the biggest challenge. Convincing South Koreans that the chicken is to be eaten cold is.

Ms Venny, 34, said: “Koreans are not used to eating cold chicken, so they asked us whether the meat should be heated up.”

Hawker Boy also serves satay, a fusion-style bak kut teh, har cheong gai and bak chor mee – the chef’s favourites from Singapore’s diverse food scene.

The restaurant’s interior is decorated to bring a slice of Singapore’s Unesco-recognised hawker culture to Seoul, with photos of hawker food and hawker centres on its walls.

The barely three-month-old eatery has yet to break even, and it now sees predominantly South-east Asian customers, with South Koreans making up less than 10 per cent of the clientele.

While disheartened that there are not as many ethnic Korean customers as he expected, Mr Jung takes comfort in customers’ encouraging feedback.

He recounts how one person who placed the same delivery order four weekends in a row later left a note in the ordering system saying that he used to order Korean fried chicken every Saturday for dinner but now preferred Hawker Boy’s chicken platter.

Ms Venny remains upbeat, saying it is a learning experience.

The couple plans to run this business for no more than two years before moving on to try something new.

“South Korea is a very competitive society so a change of environment is enticing. Perhaps Singapore next?” said Mr Jung.

This was met with a quick retort from Ms Venny: “But Singapore is so expensive!”

While she now lives in Vevey, Switzerland, with her Italian-Swiss husband and their nine-year-old Singapore-born daughter, and considers Vietnam and Switzerland her first and second homes, respectively, Singapore holds a special place in her heart.

So it was that on Aug 9, 2023, she wished Singapore a happy birthday in a Facebook post, accompanied by a photo of herself, dressed in red and white and holding a Singapore flag, with two friends at the 2008 National Day Parade – the first parade she ever attended.

Indeed, Ms Nguyen, who is also known by her pen name Thuc Minh, often reminisces about her 10-year stint in Singapore on her social media accounts, she told The Straits Times over a video call.

In a recent LinkedIn post, she shared a photo of her 10 press accreditation cards to the Shangri-La Dialogue, accumulated over the 10 years she reported on the annual defence forum held at the namesake hotel in Singapore, as the 2024 edition was taking place.

But what left a deep impression on her was the death of the founding prime minister of Singapore, Mr Lee Kuan Yew, in March 2015.

“It was one of the most memorable moments in my 10-year journalism career in Singapore,” said Ms Nguyen, adding that she spent countless hours writing a series of articles about Mr Lee’s legacy and his connection with her home country.

“I wasn’t just a tourist who came for a short time and left; Singapore was my home,” she said.

These days, Ms Nguyen often taps her Singapore experience in her current role as the president of the Swiss-Vietnamese Business Gateway non-profit association, which she founded in 2021 during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Switzerland, like Singapore, is politically neutral and both are gateways to regional markets, she said. More importantly, both are small and powerful financial centres surrounded by bigger and sometimes not-so-friendly neighbours, so navigating the environment may require an experienced hand, she added.

For Swiss businesses seeking opportunities in Asia, Ms Nguyen offers a South-east Asian perspective and vice versa for Vietnamese businesses looking to break into the European or global markets.

“Companies can have their sales or research and development hub in Singapore, and their production in Vietnam or Indonesia,” she said, adding that she regularly taps contacts she made in Singapore and the region to ensure she keeps up to date with the latest happenings.

She lauded the Singapore Government for its good governance of issues involving race and religion, noting that these are often the source of conflict in some countries. “Having different races and people from all walks of life in the same HDB block is one of the things I really like about racial harmony in Singapore,” she said of the country’s ethnic diversity.

For all the fond memories she holds of Singapore, she is aware that it is not a bed of roses.

The resistance towards foreigners, she said, is one longstanding issue that Singapore has yet to resolve adequately.

Once, a news report she wrote about Vietnamese students receiving scholarships from the Singapore Government was picked up by Singapore netizens who made many negative comments about how state funds were going to foreigners and that the Government did not care about its citizens.

She said such thinking was “a pity”, adding that “ordinary people in Singapore don’t understand that it’s a strategy to attract talent and build soft power”.

As she studied for her master’s degree in Belgium, reported in Singapore and now lives in Switzerland, Ms Nguyen muses that she has an affinity for small states.

“But it is not I that chose the countries, it’s the countries that chose me and gave me the opportunities,” she said.

“I always said that as long as there was a single person who wanted to watch the movie, I would have kept showing it,” said the 72-year-old, who described himself as the film’s “No. 1 fan”.

Mr Huang owns the second-run cineplex Wonderful Cinemas, which closed its doors after 41 years of operations in May 2022, when pandemic restrictions kept moviegoers at home.

Until then, the theatre had regularly made local headlines for Mr Huang’s persistence in screening a single Singapore movie among others.

The film stars Neo, Mark Lee and Henry Thia as three brothers facing various financial troubles while their elderly mother, played by late Malaysian actress Lai Meng, begins showing signs of dementia.

Mr Huang never planned to screen the movie for as long as he did.

“It was meant to play for only two weeks, but I loved it so much, I decided to add another week, and then another week, and another,” he said.

This was despite the film not making him money.

“Taiwanese filmgoers are more interested in either home-grown films or Hollywood blockbusters. The average Taiwanese knows little about South-east Asian films,” he explained.

But a simple love for the film kept him going.

“This is a story about filial piety and family values, and it touched me greatly. It may be a Singaporean film but the story is universal,” he said, adding that he wept the first time he watched it.

“Taiwan is a fast-ageing society, and the movie had me thinking about senior care plans for my own family,” said Mr Huang, who is married with three daughters.

While he has not lived in Singapore, he has visited the city three times, once in his early 20s and twice more in the early 2000s.

On most days, only one or two patrons would show up at his cinema to watch the film. Typically, they would be retirees looking for a space to relax for a few hours for NT$80 (S$3.30), a fraction of the average movie ticket price of at least NT$250.

On other days, schools and companies would book the hall to hold group screenings for Money No Enough 2, which helped to keep Mr Huang going financially. He declined to share his takings for the film.

One die-hard fan watched the film 40 times.

“The movie also moved him greatly – I remember he would even gather his friends to have screening parties,” Mr Huang said.

Mr Neo, the film-maker, has visited the cinema three times to thank Mr Huang, calling his promotional efforts a “miracle”. Neo has said in previous interviews that he chose to film his first overseas movie Killer Not Stupid (2018) in Taichung because of what Mr Huang had done for his work.

The other Singapore film that has impressed Mr Huang, a movie buff, is Royston Tan’s musical drama 12 Lotus (2008).

It depicts Singapore’s culture of getai, or the live stage performances held during the Hungry Ghost Festival in the belief that they will appease the spirits wandering the earth during the period.

“It’s so colourful, and I am always intrigued by how Singaporeans can speak so many different languages and dialects. That’s fascinating,” he said.

“It’s impressive that people of different ethnicities and backgrounds can all live together and understand one another. It says a lot about Singapore’s good governance and safe living environment,” he said of the country’s diverse cultures.