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Published: February 23rd 2008
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China Town - Singapore
...No more Tat please, we have enough at home!! After a 9am lie in and breakfast we took the MRT (or tube to you and me) to China Town a two stop ride away. The MRT is a clean fast and easy way to get around the city, the only problem we found was that there weren’t enough stations so you had to walk quite a distance at times to actually catch a train. We’d been advised by the guidebooks to buy an E-Z link card which can be used for both buses and MRT, an easy to use option; it saves you hunting around for change to feed the ticket machines - bus ticket machines don’t give change anyway and if you use the card you get a discounted fare on buses or MRT.
China Town was OK, nothing too exciting. When we first arrived a little old lady grabbed me by the arm and pointed to the strap on my bag - she was trying to tell me to keep it close to me and wear it across my body instead of over my shoulder. Now according to the guidebooks and from what we had read on the Internet Singapore was virtually crime free and a safe
Shopping Mall - Singapore
This is one of the smaller Malls place to visit - apparently not in China Town, we saw a couple of huge banners warning of pickpockets so a big “Thanks” to the little old lady. China Town was the usual mix of market stalls selling souvenir umbrellas, fans and chinese lanterns etc. We had a look at some of the old Shophouses, consisting of exactly that; shops on the ground floor with houses above. They are usually brightly coloured and sometimes tiled in art deco style. Anyway enough of China Town so back to the MRT and on to Little India - we spent 5 minutes there, realised quickly that we’d just left the real Big India behind and had no need or desire to see a bad duplicate of Mapsa so hopped back onto the MRT to Orchard Road for lunch and some more shopping.
After a quick lunch we went present shopping for the boys, T-shirts and boxer shorts from Hang Ten (which they loved) and we also bought a couple of backpacks for our forthcoming trip to Vietnam (and wherever else takes our fancy in South Eat Asia). Barry bargained well and we came out smiling but having to carry two huge backpacks
Backpack at the ready
....how daft do you look......probably as daft as you feel!!! around the shopping malls with us!!! Orchard Road is a shopping mecca, you can buy anything and everything in its vast variety of malls, each mall contains its own food court or hawker centre so as you can imagine the choices are endless.
Tonight we decided to have dinner at Chijmes a complex of restaurants, bars and shops. At the centre of the complex is the Anglo-French Gothic chapel that dates back to 1903 and was formerly known as the convent of the holy infant Jesus - hence the name Chijmes!!
The food on offer all sounded good but we chose to eat at a place called Gatsby. They had a great deal, buy any main course and get one FREE plus 50% off all drinks…..bargain! We both had smoked salmon to start followed by lamb washed down with cocktails, wine and beer! Highly recommended both for the quality of the food and the price, it cost SGD102 (£34) for everything including taxes and service charge.
Next stop was a bar called Eski - billed as “Singapore’s 1st sub zero bar where the temperature plummets to a shocking (-10) degrees”. They allegedly have a bar counter carved out
of ice and give out winter clothing at the door. Imagine Narnia with a bit of an igloo theme going on - we did, and got nothing like it!!! The ice bar counter was plastic, the shocking (-10) was a noisy air conditioner unit and not a sign of bear skin clothing in sight!!! We were disappointed to say the least, the place was tiny and the cocktails contained hardly any alcohol, needless to say we got on our sled and got the hell out of there quickly!!
After the disappointment of Eski the bars and atmosphere of Clarke Quay made up for it. We wandered around for a couple of hours tried out some of the bars before catching a taxi back to the Bayview via the seven eleven for a couple of cans of beer and a “microwave your own pie”
……………Next - Sentosa, Fort Siloso and the night safari.
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