title: Nodejs npm scripts fail with "SyntaxError: Unexpected token {"
body: <p>I've just imported my Reactjs project to a new machine on Ubuntu and installed most dependencies with <code>npm install</code> successfully bar the following:</p>
  
  <pre><code>npm WARN optional Skipping failed optional dependency /react-scripts/fsevents:
  npm WARN notsup Not compatible with your operating system or architecture: fsevents@1.0.17
  npm WARN optional Skipping failed optional dependency /chokidar/fsevents:
  npm WARN notsup Not compatible with your operating system or architecture: fsevents@1.1.2
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Trying to run the project with <code>npm start</code> fails with:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&gt; booking-frontend@0.1.0 start /root/17-visit-booker-frontend
  &gt; react-scripts start
  
  
  /root/17-visit-booker-frontend/node_modules/react-scripts/scripts/start.js:33
  const {
        ^
  
  SyntaxError: Unexpected token {
      at exports.runInThisContext (vm.js:53:16)
      at Module._compile (module.js:374:25)
      at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:417:10)
      at Module.load (module.js:344:32)
      at Function.Module._load (module.js:301:12)
      at Function.Module.runMain (module.js:442:10)
      at startup (node.js:136:18)
      at node.js:966:3
  
  npm ERR! Linux 4.4.0-81-generic
  npm ERR! argv "/usr/bin/nodejs" "/usr/bin/npm" "start"
  npm ERR! node v4.2.6
  npm ERR! npm  v3.5.2
  npm ERR! code ELIFECYCLE
  npm ERR! booking-frontend@0.1.0 start: `react-scripts start`
  npm ERR! Exit status 1
  npm ERR! 
  npm ERR! Failed at the booking-frontend@0.1.0 start script 'react-scripts start'.
  npm ERR! Make sure you have the latest version of node.js and npm installed.
  npm ERR! If you do, this is most likely a problem with the booking-frontend package,
  npm ERR! not with npm itself.
  npm ERR! Tell the author that this fails on your system:
  npm ERR!     react-scripts start
  npm ERR! You can get information on how to open an issue for this project with:
  npm ERR!     npm bugs booking-frontend
  npm ERR! Or if that isn't available, you can get their info via:
  npm ERR!     npm owner ls booking-frontend
  npm ERR! There is likely additional logging output above.
  
  npm ERR! Please include the following file with any support request:
  npm ERR!     /root/17-visit-booker-frontend/npm-debug.log
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Attempting to run any <code>npm</code> script including <code>npm run build</code> all fails with the exact same error referencing the same lines in each file in the SyntaxError:</p>
  
  <pre><code>SyntaxError: Unexpected token {
      at exports.runInThisContext (vm.js:53:16)
      at Module._compile (module.js:374:25)
      at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:417:10)
      at Module.load (module.js:344:32)
      at Function.Module._load (module.js:301:12)
      at Function.Module.runMain (module.js:442:10)
      at startup (node.js:136:18)
      at node.js:966:3
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Running the same scripts on my original machine, a Mac, succeed.</p>
  
  <p>I've tried re-installing <code>node</code>/<code>npm</code> which do not fix the issue. Is the supposedly optional dependency causing this to fail?</p>
  
  <p>Any help is appreciated.</p>