The economic development of a country is closely related to its national image, that is to say, it is difficult to see many dirty streets and people of low quality in a country with highly developed economic civilization. That is why there is such a contrast in the world, especially when it comes to health. There are many countries in the world. In terms of national health image, India and Singapore are the two extremes, the dirtiest and the cleanest. Many people are not surprised that India is ranked as the dirtiest country and will be surprised that the cleanest country is not Japan.
Let’s start with India, the dirtiest country in the world. Although many people have never been to India, nowadays, with the extremely developed Internet, they sometimes read news about various behaviors of Indian people on the Internet. As a result, India comes across not only as “dirty” but also as “strange”. Take the Ganges River, the source of India’s holy water. This river carries the beliefs and cultural civilization of many Indians, but it brings a physical impact on us. Unlike ordinary rivers, the Ganges is seen by Indians as a river where they can bring good fortune to themselves and their families by bathing and drinking.
Apart from the difference in meaning, the Ganga itself is different from other rivers. The discharge of industrial waste makes the river look uninspiring, and with the rise of India’s water-burial culture, the floating corpses of the river also make it difficult to get into the water. A common sight along the Ganges River is the crowds of people bathing in the water and praying for good luck, as well as cremation and water burial. Without living in such a civilization, it is hard to imagine such a “dirty river” in the ordinary sense, and even harder to imagine people drinking and bathing. Apart from the Ganges, one of the most common images of squalor in India is its slums. Although India’s technology is advanced and the productivity of the whole country is not low, the gap between the rich and the poor is too large, which gives rise to the slum culture in India.
Slums, as the name implies, are areas where the poor live, as many people know from Indian movies and TV shows. The degree of hygiene is positively related to the degree of civilization. In a place where you can’t even guarantee your own food and clothing, you should not expect the degree of hygiene. People living in slums seem to have no concept of hygiene, the narrow and depressing between streets, garbage and excrement on the road, flies, almost everyone has a face called numbness expression. It was like a place completely separated from civilization.
The absolute opposite of India’s “squalor” is one of the cleanest countries in the world, Singapore. If a comparison is to be made for health reasons, in terms of countries, a large part of it may be due to the size of the two countries. India is a populous country and the growing number of people in a fixed area has put a certain burden on the country’s economy. While Singapore has a small land area and relatively small population, the growth of high-quality people plays a positive role in the image of the whole country. On the other hand, Singapore is another scene. In fact, the population density of Singapore is not low, but there is no feeling of cars competing with pedestrians on the streets, and people will not feel crowded. There will be no grey air, which may be the reason that few cars are seen running on the road, less exhaust emissions, the air is naturally fresher.
Urban main streets and streets, can give people a sense of order. People and shops are going about their business in an orderly way, and there is not a trace of garbage on the road. Walking on the roads in Singapore, the overall feeling is clean and comfortable. Unlike the overflowing trash cans that can be found everywhere in India, even in Singapore’s busy shopping streets, it’s hard to see a trash can on the street, let alone a messy one. There is little food waste to be seen here, and to put it an exaggeration, the streets look as if they have just been mopped. And these countless positive images of the city are constrained by Singapore’s strict health laws. It is the constraint of law on people’s behavior that has created the generally high-quality people in Singapore today. Nowadays, Singaporeans have developed a sense of conscious sanitation and environmental protection.
And this awareness in another aspect of the invisible promote the development of national economy, the first is the tourism economy, who will refuse to such a clean country. Then there is the national image of Singapore as a whole, which presents itself to the world in a positive and clean manner. In any case, a country’s health awareness and economic civilization and other aspects of development are inseparable. The comparison between India and Singapore also gives us a warning that while developing the economy, we should also pay attention to environmental awareness, which is the manifestation of everyone’s responsibility and a kind of national lofty consciousness.
