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Published: January 28th 2008
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...then Singapore people should marry Indians ;-]. Singapore is the absolute opposite of India when it comes to the things that all us tourists complain about when visiting India. They might come to a middle way: Singapore without the silly rules and fines, India with clean streets.
Arrival Monday evening at Changi Airport. After customs comes a walk through the airconditioned duty free zone. Like.. like... like... *really, really* clean and modern. More modern than Heathrow! Free internet for everybody to use (15 minutes limit). Hard to move on, I just wanted to go enjoy the luxury asap! Get a hot chocolate or something...anything yummie that I would not have found in India. But no time for that. Had to move on, go through customs and pick up my luggage. 15 Minutes later, I had a decent map of Singapore and a bunch of tourist information in my hands, and a friendly lady at the tourist information desk explaining to me how to get to my hostel, and what things I could do during my short stay. Amazing. The building is meticulously clean, with a lot of windows and very spacious halls that guide the people to their destinations without
ever getting a claustrophobic feeling. Shining floors, almost like mirrors. No roaches. No rickshaw drivers. No beggars. No underfed mother with 3 children sleeping on the floor in the waiting halls. Couldn't resist anymore, so had a burger with French fries and mayonnaise and a diet coke in the Burger King before going to the hostel.
On to the subway station. Same cleanliness and spacious architecture. An employee by the ticket machine, just to help tourists who don't know how the machine works. No waiting line with 10 Indians trying to get ahead of me. No paper tickets. Only plastic electronic badges, for which you pay a 1 SGD (=0.5 euro) deposit to ensure you won't throw it away and it can be reused. Even returning the deposit is done by the ticket machine upon arrival. Nobody pushing to get on the platform first. The train was already waiting. Hyper-modern, meticulously clean, plenty of available seats, no sweaty bodies pressed against each other. Gentle, silent ride. Ah yes, silence too! I had to get off at the 5th stop or so, and then just walk around 50m to my hostel.
The hostel: shining white floors, plenty of other
westerners, a modern kitchen. I was too tired though, so went straight to bed (4 beds dormitory, bunk beds). A *real* mattress! Air conditioning! I couldn't sleep though. Partly my own fault. The diet coke. My nose and sinuses were clogged again after a few days in Trivandrum, and the air pressure when landing had made it worse. Took half a sleeping pill at 2AM and finally fell asleep. Slept in until 10AM. No windows in the room, so no sunlight coming in to tell me that the day had started. So basically only half a day left to see Singapore. I decided to reschedule my flight and stay one day longer.
There was a festival going on in an area of Singapore called "Little India".. Hadn't I just *left* India? I went there anyway. A dozen of Hindu Indians walking around the area with needles and hooks through their skins. Strange to be amongst the Indians again, whilst being in Singapore.
Had my hair cut short again. I think I am doomed to have short hair forever. Whenever I try to let it grow, it just gets a messy shape. The "senior hair stylist" was appointed to
Singapore - MRT train (subway)
Compare this one to the train in the Mumbai blog ;-) advise me. His advice was to cut it just the way I have always had it before basically, but he had good head-massaging hands!
After that... time to indulge. Singapore entirely fits the expression "shop till you drop". It's one big shopping mall after another. Each of these malls larger than the largest mall in Belgium, and each having endless choice in luxuriously decorated restaurants with all kinds of cuisines. Each and every one of those restaurants will get anyone's mouth filled with water and wanting more. It was very hard to decide on what I wanted to eat. So I had my favorite: sushi with lots of wasabi... just missed sharing that with friends!
Ended the day with a visit to Chinatown. The lunar new year is on February 7th, so Chinatown is completely decorated. A lot of red. In any case, life on the streets after 8pm (unlike in India where the streets are dead at that time).
So the next day was just more shopping and shopping and shopping. Several malls just next to each other at Harbour Front. The challenge here isn't shaking off the rickshaw drivers who will take you to often
Singapore
Seatbelts for the middle seat in the last row of the bus uninteresting shops hoping you'll spend money. The question is: do you have the discipline to work your way through the malls without spending more money than you wanted, and will you get out of the mall before dark so you can actually try to see something on Sentosa Island?. No and No. The temptations here are simply too overwhelming. All sorts of massage and fitness tools, all the electronics you can dream of, more food than you can ever eat, all brands of designer clothes and perfumes. Everything. Sure, it's all just about consumption again, but I did enjoy the feeling of luxury while shopping. I even felt like dressing up in expensive clothes and going out. Not usually something I really desire. But nice to realize that I did, even though it was not an option at this point.
I did make it to Sentosa Island, just not before dark. I don't really regret that I didn't have more time, because I would have just spent way too much money on the attractions. It's like a small Disney land. Fun and pretty in its own way, but artificial and only created with commercial targets in mind.
For
those of you who don't know about the silly rules in Singapore, here are some examples:
# If you are leaving Singapore by car, your tank has to be at least ¾ full. This rule only applies for Singapore cars.
# Bringing in or having chewing gum is entirely forbidden in Singapore. It was banned to cut the high costs of keeping the city clean. A few times chewing gum was stuck between the doors of the MRT train and resulted in the fact that the trains we not able to run any longer. This resulted in an entire ban of chewing gum.
# Littering is another 'fine' offense to the city of Singapore. Fines are set at S$500, but can rise up to S$1,000 for the first time you get caught. Being caught a second time could cause you S$2,000 and a Corrective Work Order.
(the full link to the rules: www.singapore.alloexpat.com/expatriates_living_in_singapore_tips/legislation_singapore.php)
I'll write a separate blog about my arrival in Vietnam. Easier for people browsing by location.
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alexander
non-member comment
nice haircut !!!
Hello Sabrina, it looks nice your haircut like this, anyway, just wanna say I am glad to hear from you that you're doing well. By the way, I have changed of work too. I am working at Spa now in a 5 stars hotel called "Manoir de Lébioles" as "Maître". Check it out on the internet and you will see. You're already invited there on your return. Might be a culture choc. Take care of you. Greetings from the rest of us. Alexander.