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Published: August 10th 2009
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My Journey to Singapore took a total of 25 hours (I slept about 3-5 hrs of it). including two layovers; one in Detroit and the other at Narita, Tokyo. In Tokyo I had about two hours before my next flight, so I decided to explore the airport, which sounds really lame; but I found some cool stuff and I managed to get myself kicked out of a private lounge (I walked in thinking it was a normal bar). I saw calamari and some type of fish bagged up and hanging in a small store. I also bought myself my own beer for the first timewhile I was there. it was a Sapporo and it was great.
The rest of the travel was relatively uneventful. I arrived in the airport and went through customs by literally walking through some doors; they didn't check my bags or anything. In the same sentence there was only 1 person on duty since it was 2 in the morning. The school, Nanyang Technological University (NTU) sent someone with a bus to pick up myself and several other students arriving at a similar time. In fact we all arrived within 1 hour of each and 7
out of the 12 of the students there were from RPI. So that was great to immediately run into students from my school. We have stuck together so far in these past couple of days here and I can see us continuing that throughout our stay. It took us a 45 min. bus ride to drive accross the entire country/island, during which I tried my hardest to stay up. In the glimpses I saw of the country it was immediately obvious that it was EXTREMELY clean. Absolutly NO highway garbage, seriously. Also I don't remember ever seeing any houses, every 5 minutes or so I saw another cluster of towers that looked like high end apartments (which they were). That night I got back to my room, tried to contact my parents (failed) and then went to sleep (it was about 3).
Woke up the next day around 9. Wasn't tired at all really (which surprised me). My first meal here cost me $1.50 singapore dollars, and it consisted of soft boiled eggs, toast with "kaya butter," and a choice of coffee or tea. The eggs were wet and drippy and took some strength to spoon up, but since
Bagged Calamari
Bagged food in Japan that first time I am quite comfortable with them and enjoy them thoroughly. The kaya-butter was phenomenal. Best spread that I have ever tasted on toast. It was yellow and tasted almost like butter, but it is sweeter with sugar and has the consistency of a jam, anyways it's fantastic. The tea likewise had some white creamy stuff at the bottom, and when I stirred that up it was good as well.
In the next short hours we befriended some kids from Canada, all of which came from the same school, but only 2 of which actually knew one another (Western College). As a group (of about 15) we went to register with the International Student Center, took care of that and then headed off to the mall. We made it to Jurong Point mall by way of a train (that was WICKED clean) that only cost $1.00. The mall was HUGE and there were LOADS off people all over the place. I didn't buy much more than an adapter for my outlet, but I got to see a lot of the locals and some interesting products including....roasted duck (fully roasted). It was a great trip. I also purchased
Campus Building
They're Entertainment and Media building a 6-pack (of beer) for later that night.
That night the plan was to go to an exchange student party on campus. We, my fellow RPI students accompanied by our Canadian friends, were on our way over at 11:00 when we ran into 2 Scottsmen coming from the party. They informed us the party was leaving and then reconvening at the Largest club in the country, St. James' Power Station (the Powerstation). We simply couldn't pass up that oppurtunity. We went back, dressed up, and hit the town. It was absolutely amazing. People everywhere, the music was loud, the first two drinks were free (included in the cover charge), and the place was jumping! We had a great time and we headed back to campus around 3:15 by cab.
That was how I spent the first 24 hours in the country. Quite an introduction. I hope all of you who read this will continue to do just that during the next 4-5 months, and I hope you enjoy as I know I'm going to.
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