Rating:
 ( 4.9
) ( 174 votes )
Singapore, Singapore
Aug 27, 2003 08:58
Pros:
clean, beautiful place
Cons: none
Asia at last! After 15 hours of flight and a stopover in Tokyo we
finally arrived...slept in Singapore's Changi airport which we must
tell you about. Supreme facilities - bamboo and cactus gardens,
among others, movie lounge, rooftop pool, health spa, and a great
viewing/resting area that served us very well. A tourist destination
in itself!
Singapore is a great introduction to SE Asia as it is a conglomeration
of several different cultures - composed primarily of Malays, Tamil
(southern) Indians, and Chinese. Everyone speaks English but all
signs (subway, road, advertisements) are in English, Chinese, Malay,
and Tamil. Very modern city, awesome subway system, diverse and
delicious food. They drive on the left here and it follows that
when walking around you stay on the left hand side of the sidewalk
and when entering doors, etc. This is hard to remember. Taoists
burn piles of paper all over the sidewalk so that they will be reunited
with their deceased relatives in the afterlife. In Little India,
where we are staying, there are flower garlands everywhere and burning
incense wafting out of all the shops, women in beautiful saris roam
the streets. We entered our first mosque yesterday, they provided
Lauren with a robe to cover her womanly skin. You have to take your
shoes off to enter any temples, mosques, and our hostel, and should
always walk in a clockwise direction in order to not offend the
gods. Instead of sunless tanning lotions being the rage, here things
with names like "white essence" are advertised everywhere
- products that block melanin production in the skin. All sunscreens
are SPF 50 and women walk with umbrellas on sunny days. The Muslim
women wear headscarves but remain stylish otherwise - makeup, jeans
and high heels.
Mostly we have done a ton of walking and eating but today we went
to the Singapore zoo. Extremely open and interactive. You are basically
walking among the animals and monkeys are swinging above your head.
3 foot lizards sun on the walkways.
Singapore is an interesting clash of the old and the new. We like
it here but tomorrow a.m. we depart for Malaysia. |
