Between the years 1932 and 1994, there stood a mosque with a distinctive gable wall design along the upper reaches of Jalan Eunos, on the hilly area between Jalan Eunos Malay Settlement (phase 1, 1930s) and its extension at Kaki Bukit (1950s).
The mosque’s original context in Jalan Eunos Malay Settlement / Kaki Bukit can be seen at the upper right quarter of this map from 1972, which also shows the larger context of this area in relation to Geylang Serai.
This mosque, built with an endowment from the immensely wealthy Alkaff family (who also endowed another mosque at Upper Serangoon Road, nearby), originally stood at the junction between Jalan Eunos and Jalan Abadi**.
** “Jalan Abadi” ironically means “Eternal Road”; it was completely erased in the mid-1980s, along with all the other roads in the settlement (some of which bear historically significant names of important individuals in Singapore history) .
Front gable wall and minaret of Masjid Alkaff Kampung Melayu in 1994, just before demolition.
Photograph by Muhd Noh.
There are no other mosques in Singapore (or for that matter in the whole world) with a gable design quite like this. It is a real pity that the mosque was completely erased in its 62nd year of existence. Even someone at the age of 16 as I was back then (yes, that’s me standing there) without yet any notion of “heritage” could feel that this was travesty.
Between 1983 and 1988, all the houses and the roads which stood on hilly terrain around the mosque were bulldozed away completely. So for about a decade (c.1985-1994) the old mosque stood isolated on its high ground – the surrounding area had been flattened, leaving a mound of earth with scarred slopes still etched by the marks of bulldozers. This mound was just large enough to allow the mosque to remain standing in its original elevation. This was the condition in which I first encountered it in the late 1980s, and very rudimentary, raw-concrete steps allowed access to the mosque up the aforementioned scarred “slope” from Kaki Bukit HDB estate.
View of the old Masjid Alkaff Kampung Melayu from Blk 128, Kaki Bukit
Photograph taken in 1994 by Imran bin Tajudeen.
This aerial view of the mosque from its “rear” shows several things about its basic architectural features. It has a rectangular plan main prayer hall with a jack roof, attached to the gable wall at its front, mihrab end.
Appended to its back is the serambi, a kind of ante-chamber or front hall which receives the visitor before he/she enters the main hall. The photograph below shows this serambi and its relationship to the main hall.
Other additional spaces have been added to the mosque with simple lean-to (sloping) roofs, in the ad-hoc manner of vernacular structures.
The old Masjid Alkaff Kampung Melayu, seen from the rear to its right side.
On the right is the main prayer hall; to its left is the adjoining serambi annex, an ante-chamber pavilion addition typical of mosques in Southeast Asia.
To this serambi an the mosque has been extended further with a simple lean-to (sloping ) roof.
Photograph taken in 1994 by Imran bin Tajudeen.
In 1994, just before its demolition, I decided to take some photographs, going with my younger brother who gamely agreed to accompany me on this little excursion. The result is the series of photos you see here.
I regret not having also had the chance to take photos of the interior of the main hall, which I recall to be spacious, cavernous, and very tranquil. The mosque had already been shut and padlocked, never to open its doors again… 🙁
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