Tourist Finds Merlion Under Maintenance, Internet Creatively Obliges His Request For Photoshop

Internet Helps To Photoshop Hilarious Merlion Photo For Tourist From Taiwan

The Merlion is perhaps Singapore’s most iconic symbol, attracting tourists to its spot in Marina Bay.

Unfortunately, one tourist missed out on a photo opportunity with the statue.

As it turns out, the Merlion is currently covered by scaffolding for repair works till 13 Dec.

Undeterred, the tourist took to Facebook with a posed photo and requested for users to Photoshop the Merlion in.

The Internet obliged the only way it knew how to, with absurd and comedic photo edits.

Tourist finds Merlion closed for repairs

In a post in a Hong Kong Facebook group, tourist Xie Chengxuan (謝承軒) took a trip to see Singapore’s iconic Merlion.

Unfortunately for him, he missed the memo on the Merlion’s maintenance and instead found some scaffolding.

Not letting that stop him, he uploaded a photo to Facebook.

In it, he performed the classic ‘lean-backwards-and-look-up’ pose that every tourist seems to do — as though pretending to drink the Merlion’s water spout.

“The Merlion is undergoing repairs,” he wrote in the post, “please help me Photoshop it back, thanks.”

Unfortunately, such a request was practically equivalent to poking a hornet’s nest.

The best photo editors in the group quickly descended upon the photo, producing doctored images that might have deviated from the original brief.

Internet obliges request for Merlion Photoshop

One netizen showed a rather liberal interpretation of a ‘fish-tailed lion’ and its ‘water spout’.

Another person cut out the ‘middleman’ entirely, replacing the water source with copies of Mr Xie in an edit titled “self-sufficience”. It’s Mr Xie all the way up.

One cunning commenter took the instructions literally and added the Merlion in place of Mr Xie.

Another picture had the statue in the proper place but seemed to have gotten a little mixed up with the countries.

In place of the Merlion, stood the Sphinx.

If the Sphinx is here on exchange in Singapore, perhaps the Merlion is enjoying a nice vacation at the Pyramids of Giza.

Photos also show reversed roles

A hero came through with a Photoshop job including both the Merlion and Mr Xie, with the right water spout too.

However, the roles appeared to have been reversed — with Mr Xie “spitting” out the water at the Merlion.

One kinder user did a decent job, though it seemed Mr Xie missed the waterspout by a hundred metres or so.

“I tried,” the editor wrote.

One commenter actually made a video edit, showing that the Merlion had clearly taken the time to level up and learn Hydro Pump.

Out of all the edits, one came the closest to what Mr Xie originally asked for.

“I just got back from Changsha,” an evidently merciful netizen said, “there’s a Merlion at the Window of the World there.”

Although the Merlion was still in the wrong spot, Mr Xie appeared to have been content with the photo.

“Thanks, bro,” he replied.

While he may not have gotten to see the Merlion, Mr Xie got a hilarious dive into the work of Internet Photoshoppers.

Hopefully, he’ll get to see the Merlion in the flesh the next time he visits Singapore.

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Featured image adapted from Song Hung Wang, and Paul Chia on Facebook.