SINGAPORE

The following is a running dialogue from our recent trip, comprised of notes and photos taken while we were there and some commentary that I’ve added upon returning home...

Our arrival into Singapore was perhaps the easiest arrival to a destination we've experienced. While it may have taken virtually 24 hours of travel to get there, once we arrived, the airport and subway, both modern and easy to navigate, which is a running theme in Singapore, delivered us to our hotel's doorstep in no time at all and for about $1 US. Certainly a far cry from landing in Lima, Peru and trying to sort out a taxi ride with relentless drivers coming at you, most looking to rip you off. Some people derisively call Singapore a sterile city. And while it doesn't have the frenetic pulse (or pollution) like other Asian cities we've visited, such as Bangkok or even Kuala Lumpur, which we visited later in the trip, it does have a lot going for it. In many ways Singapore is the prototypical modern 21st century metropolis. It has the before mentioned modern transportation system, the modern skyline, and the general cleanliness not seen in any other urban setting. Mix in the colonial architecture that contrasts with the uber-modern designs, the tropical temperatures and greenery that juxtapose the urban landscape and the diversity of the people - a mix of Chinese, Malay and Indian - and it's really unlike any other city. For some it's the right mixture and for others they are put off. For me, I’m clearly the former as I took to it right away, feeling comfortable and very at home with the surroundings. Of course you still have to be careful not to litter or chew gum, lest you get the cane. Actually, despite its reputation as having many rules and strictly enforcing them, we hardly saw any police and we did in fact see some people littering. So either they are surveilling their citizens using high-tech and these people were rounded up later, or things are a little more easy going than the reputation. We decided not to push our luck by testing that theory though, as we were law abiding visitors.

After our seamless arrival, unpacking, and a brief sigh from the 18+ hours of plane flights (SFO to Taipei to Singapore), we rallied and took a walk around Little India our first night. As you would expect it was replete with plenty of Indian shops and Indian people. Though mostly Indian men. In fact it became a running joke, as K was virtually the only woman we saw for hours and I was the only man without a mustache. The only way we did fit in was that we were holding hands, which oddly enough most of the Indian men were as well. It was sort of like an Indian version of the Castro, complete with the brightly colored buildings, though I don't think the implied meaning of the hand holding gesture was the same. We did eventually discover that all the Indian women were in fact around, simply inside the air-conditioned malls shopping. Seeing as it was sweltering hot and humid outside, a strong case could be made, using this as an example, that women are in fact smarter than men. As we would discover, shopping, as well as eating, are practically the national pastimes in Singapore. Speaking of eating, we ate at one of the many food courts, called hawker stalls, our first night. Basically a sort of hybrid of a farmer's market and food courts at the mall, though more along the lines of farmer's markets in that everything is homemade and clearly mom & pop shops. We steered clear of the turtle soup, but did have some tasty bites nonetheless. We managed to make it up to about 10p that first night, trying to stay up late enough to get ourselves on the right time zone, as Singapore is 16 hours ahead of SF, so we essentially lost an entire day flying.

On Monday, we set out on another walking excursion, which is more or less how we see big cities when we travel. Between walking around Singapore and then later Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, we literally probably walked at least 20 miles between the 2 cities. On this day we first headed to the Colonial area of town, which is situated near the waterfront downtown. We somehow stumbled into an underground mall, which was massive. Most of the stores were closed it was so early, but because it was air-conditioned, people were using it as a thruway to get around the city. We then again stumbled into the Esplanade, the large modern theater in Singapore nicknamed "The Durians" for it's resemblance to the spiky (and stinky) fruit by that name (more on durians in the next post). At that point we sort of had a stop and start to our walk as K had to give up on the flip flops (her feet weren't quite ready for the lack of support given the miles we were putting on) and head back to the hotel so she could grab her sneaks. The jet lag sort of caught up with us as the return trip (and the sight of a bed) necessitated a brief nap, but we soon rallied, heading out again this time to Chinatown. After cruising some of the shops, which remarkably had very similar junk to what's sold in SF's Chinatown, we found a great place to get some dim sum (again keeping with Singapore's pastimes of shopping + eating).

Later that afternoon we made our way back downtown to the waterfront area to check out the Asian Civilization museum, which features art from SE Asia, China, and India. In addition to some interesting art from the region, it had some pretty cool interactive video displays, and it was also very air-conditioned, which made it a nice (cool) break from all the walking. Singapore's population is about 75% Chinese, with the rest being Malay and Indian. Despite being an Asian city, everything is in English - street signs, billboards, directions, etc, and everyone speaks English. It is in fact their unofficial official language. So in that way it doesn't feel so foreign, and is probably one of the things people cite when they knock the city as too sterile, but from a traveler's perspective, or at least a traveler who speaks English, it makes it quite easy to get around. That is if you bother to figure out where you're going. That night we were attempting to visit the night safari out at the zoo but, no thanks to our Lonely Planet guide, we didn't allow enough time to get out there and see the safari before turning around to catch the last train home. So instead we ended up taking a very long subway ride around the city before aborting and heading to an ex-pat indie rock pub in Little India for a beverage. As a side note I would just say that the 2003 Malaysia/Singapore Lonely Planet guide is crap. LP is our travel book of choice and by and large has always done us right, but this one really didn't pass the test. It's lousy on so many fronts it's not worth detailing. They just released a new version this month, unfortunately too late for us, so hopefully it's better than the one we had.

Tuesday morning we set out on a train for Malaysia with our destination being Taman Negara, a large national park in the rainforest. More on Singapore when we return at the end of the trip. More on Malaysia in the next post in a few days. If you want to be notified automatically when I add the next post, simply add your email address into the box on the upper right, or subscribe to the feed.