Singapore: Home Is Where The Heart Is


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Asia » Singapore
June 9th 2009
Published: November 16th 2009
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our very, very small room in South East Asia Hotel
On a cold winter night, we flew in from Perth, Australia to Singapore via Jetstar Airways. It was our first time to fly Jetstar and we were curious on how it was going to be. Aside from the 1-hour flight delay, the trip was comfortable and uneventful. You do have to pay for everything aboard, including food (there was one complimentary bottle of water though), entertainment, and blankets/comfort pack. You have to pay in the currency of your departure OR arrival country. Hot meals go for AUD15, softdrinks and juices for AUD3 and alcoholic drinks for AUD6+. Since we had an early dinner, we went for sandwiches (AUD6) and a small can of Pringles (AUD3). The sandwich tasted like cardboard 😊

We arrived in Singapore before 7AM, changed some money, took a couple of maps from the Tourist Centre and took a public taxi to our hotel, South East Asia Hotel. The cab driver was not very familiar with the hotel but after relaying the instructions given by the hotel, he recognized it and drove there straight away.

ACCOMMODATIONS
South East Asia Hotel is located in Waterloo St., right between Skyline Building and Kwam Im Temple. It is at
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our very, very small room in South East Asia Hotel
the back of famous shopping haunt Bugis Village. The hotel faces a square and the small entrance is not visible from Bencoolen Link where you will alight -- you have to walk about 30 meters to see it. During the day, flower and incense vendors litter the square as people come to visit the temple beside it. There are plenty of food kiosks as well and across the park is a sort of extension to Bugis Village where various goods are sold during the day.

Upon arrival, we were told that “check-ins are usually at 2PM but fortunately for you, a room is ready”. We were also asked for a cash payment of SGD100 for our stay that night. Since we still needed to change more money, we had to leave our passports at the reception.

Our room was shockingly small and stank of stale cigarette smoke. The toilet/shower was ridiculous - the shower head is right behind the door so that when you shower, the door will be right at your side, your back to the wall, and the lavatory sink on your other side. There were no mats or dividers inside so water will be literally
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view from our room
everywhere by the time you finish showering. Needless to say, since we wanted so badly to just sleep, we took the room. (Don’t ask me why we stuck with the room for 3 nights - we were out most of the time and I was too tired to pack everything and move again to another hotel. A week and 3 countries later, our clothes still stank. Ugh.)

DAY 1: SINGAPORE ZOO AND NIGHT SAFARI
After a short nap, we proceeded to buy our Singapore Tourist Passes to avail of the unlimited train rides for SGD8/day. You can only get this at select stations but since the Ticket Office at Bugis was still closed, we bought one-way tickets to City Hall station and bought our passes there.

Armed with our EZ-link cards, we proceeded on a stupid merry-go-round of train rides, hoping to catch the Singapore Walks’ tour of Chinatown. Unfortunately, since it was a spur-of-the-moment decision and I was relying only on the memory of my previous tour with them, I took us to Newton instead of Tanjong Pagar station. In short, we missed the walking group and instead just headed straight away to Chinatown via MRT.
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view from our room

In Chinatown, we just went window-shopping, intending to go back when our friends from the Philippines have arrived to meet us. We had our first lunch in Singapore there as well, yummy 😊

From Chinatown, we went to Orchard to do a little shopping before going to the Zoo. We did not want to spend too much time at the Zoo since it was very hot and well, you can only take so much of animals 😊

After shopping, we again took the MRT, this time to Ang Mo Kio station where we have to catch the bus going to the Singapore Zoo. At the train, a Singapore Chinese guy chatted me up and since he was going the same way, he went with us to the bus station and deposited us in the queue for the bus to the zoo. He asked us to bring a bottle of water with us to the zoo as it is very hot there and food and drinks were expensive.

Arriving at the Zoo, we bought our package tickets to the Zoo and the Night Safari (SGD32 each + SGD15 each for the trams). I’ve been to the Zoo twice
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our impossibly small bathroom
before and while they say that the park is 100%!w(MISSING)alkable, the tram is a must as it is usually sweltering hot and walking all the way is very exhausting (believe me, I’ve done it once before). The trams are now unlimited - it used to be that you can only complete one round (1 stamp on each of the 4 stations) - and it allowed us to stay longer in the Zoo, catching one animal show after another. We watched the elephants show, the dolphin and sea lions show, and the polar bear feeding session. Apart from that, we just walked around and took pictures of the animals (and the people walking about hihi). We had an ice cream bite at Ben & Jerry’s and the verdict is that it is nothing spectacular and not worth the price (it’s really expensive!). We’ve had better ice creams eaten here at home 😊

The Zoo closes at 6PM and the Night Safari opens at 7PM so we hung-out for a couple of drinks at one of the bars inside Night Safari until it opened. As soon as it did, we queued for the Creatures of the Night show. This particular show was the best among the 3 times I’ve watched it. It was highly-entertaining, comic, amusing, and informational as well.

After the show, we queued for the guided tram ride around the park where all the various animals are shown in their “open” spaces. It was good fun spending the day at the 2 zoos and always, it’s a good way to kick-start your visit to Singapore.

For dinner, we took a cab outside the Night Safari and went to the East Coast Lagoon Food Village (which was a loooong way away from the Zoo) where we searched for Stall 6 named Leng Heng BBQ Seafood & Claypot Deluxe. It is featured in the Singapore Hawker Legends Food Trails. For roughly SGD30, we had an excellent dinner of a humongous fish head claypot, rice and fruit drinks 😊 If we had more room in our stomachs, I would have wanted to try the BBQ Stingray, another specialty, and the Satay Bee Hoon from another featured kiosk (Stall 17, Meng Kee Satay Bee Hoon). After dinner, it was a bit of a wait but we were finally able to hail a cab to take us back to our hotel.
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lunch at chinatown


DAY 2: THE REUNION AND SENTOSA
After trying out the vegetarian buffet breakfast of our hotel (so-so), we went to church. Our church, ironically, is located in the red-light district of Geylang. But as it was day time, there wasn’t so much to see. It was an interesting trip though. After a couple of hours, we went back to our hotel to change clothes for “the reunion”.

Day 2 finds us walking excitedly towards Bugis MRT where we will be meeting our friends - Kim’s best friend Dudz and his Singapore-based fiancée Hannah. They were a bit late which gave us time to explore Bugis Village. This is Singapore street fashion and you can find many cute although sometimes tacky, items here. Shopping was not very productive here as the same items can be found in the Philippines at a cheaper price.

Finally, it was time to meet Dudz and Hannah. Standing underneath the Victoria Street street sign at the busy Bugis intersection, the much-awaited reunion finally came. After some picture-taking to mark the momentous occasion (haha), we accompanied Dudz to the nearby money changer and off we went to the MRT station to go to Sentosa!
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lunch at chinatown


We alighted at Harbourfront Station and went to Vivo City where we were to catch the new monorail Sentosa Express at the 3rd floor. But first we had lunch at the Makan Food Centre. The food court is very nicely-designed with more than enough choices to satisfy a casual diner. The four of us bought food from several kiosks but sadly, not a one stood out, everything was so-so and the servings quite small.

We bought our Sentosa Express tickets from the ticket machines and took the monorail ride to the Palawan Beach station. Upon arrival, we immediately bought our tickets for the 7:45PM show of Songs of the Sea then queued for the tram going to Palawan Beach. Armed with maps, we explored Palawan Beach with its oil-slicked waters and fake sand and hiked to the Southernmost Point of Continental Asia, which was really nothing more than a hanging bridge and 2 towers. It was a nice pit stop though and we spent maybe half an hour there recuperating from the heat.

Walking to the bus station, we passed by the comfort rooms where we freshened up. Lockers and showers are available for those who went
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lunch at chinatown
swimming in the beach. It is very tourist-friendly, excellent actually, considering many locals flock here during the weekends to cool off (even the water features were full of kids trying to get as cool and wet as they possibly can!).

Next stop was 4D Magix and Cineblast, back-to-back. Ticket prices are somewhat expensive at SGD30/person for the combo. It was ok, we enjoyed the Cineblast more than the 4D Magix, but once in a lifetime is enough.

After we have recovered from our dizziness in the cinemas, we trudged to the nearby Imbiah area to check out more attractions. We were planning on riding the Luge but there’s a SGD4 discount per person when you buy your tickets past 6:30PM and present your Songs of the Sea tickets. Since there was less than an hour to kill, we decided to do the Merlion Walk which was very pleasant and took photos of the Merlion. At 6:30PM, we bought our discounted tickets hehe (SGD7 from SGD11), donned our helmets and went on our Luge rides. It was so fun and exhilarating! This, combined with Songs of the Sea, really made our Sentosa experience worthwhile! The Skyride going down to
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hehehehe
base coincided with sunset and it was just beautiful and relaxing 😊

Off to Songs of the Sea where everyone seems to have converged, we capped-off our day in Sentosa with this spectacular multi-million dollar light and sounds show. It is probably the best value feature in Sentosa and it was just so amazing, there is no point describing it - just go watch it!

After we have successfully returned to Vivo City, again by the Sentosa Express (it was jampacked!), we window-shopped a bit then proceeded to Chinatown for some late dinner. In Chinatown, I successfully located a restaurant specializing in dimsums. This was recommended by our guide when I did the Chinatown Singapore Walks a few years’ ago and have always made it a point to dine here whenever I am in Singapore. Curiously, I never bothered to memorize or even find out the name of the restaurant and I just look for it by the pictures on display on its walls. Luckily on my second try, I found it.
We feasted on hot prawn and porkchop noodles, mouth-watering dimsums, and special homemade tofu, all served personally by the owner-chef Mr. Wong. Since we were the only guests, Mr. Wong gladly answered all our questions and even acquiesced to our request to have a photo taken with him pulling noodles (like the pictures in the walls hehe). Of course, no one had to ask where the noodles went (to our table, of course!). Mr. Wong’s claim to fame is being featured in MTV Europe AND Discovery Asia in Bobby Chin’s show. And with that, I made sure to take a photo of the restaurant’s signage so I won’t miss it next time 😊

After a couple of drinks in one of the kiosks in Food Street, we went to Hannah’s place for more drinks and went back to the hotel at past 4AM!

DAY 3: SIA HOP-ON HOP-OFF TOUR
When we were finally able to haul ourselves out of bed, we had a very quick breakfast of toast and jam/butter (grudgingly served to us by SEA Hotel - breakfast - vegetarian buffet or toast -- was supposed to be up to 10:30AM. We came down at 10:25AM and were reprimanded by the old lady at reception to be early next time. WTF! When we got to the restaurant, it was spic n’ span already meaning they cleaned up so much earlier than 10:30AM!).

We walked to the SIA HoHo station nearest us and in a few minutes were onboard the Singapore Airlines Hop-on, Hop-off City Tour bus. For SGD12/person (exact change only please), you can ride all you want all day and explore the city’s attractions. The only downside to this one is the bus schedules which you might miss (like we did), then you wait a long time for the next one. A bus comes every 15 minutes, depending on traffic.

Our first stop was the Esplanade where we planned to walk from going to the Merlion Park. But hung-over, sleepy and hot, we decided to be lazy and just wait for the next bus that will drop us off Merlion Park. We missed it and ended up staring for more than 30 minutes at the Singapore Flyer which was very visible from the Esplanade station. When we finally got on the bus, we decided spur-of-the-moment to proceed to Little India for lunch first before doing another round starting from the Merlion Park. Bad, bad move! The traffic was so bad, it took us more than 2 hours to reach Little India. Oh, and there was also a mandatory 45-minute or 1-hour stop at the Botanical Gardens (we just slept on the benches).

At Little India, I relied on memory again looking for the wet market hawkers’ area. I was looking for Alauddin’s Briyani which was another recommendation, this time from the Little India Singapore Walks. I have dined there about thrice before and was positive I can find it again. Only, the entire public market was gone! Where it used to be now stands a building with what looks like several floors of parking space! Hungry, irritated, and with Kim nauseous from the smells of Little India, we ended up taking out food from Old Chang Kee (huhu) then taking a cab to Mustafa to do a little shopping. Unfortunately, there was nothing exciting in Mustafa so we took a cab back to the HoHo station and waited for the next bus.

After spending more time again in traffic, we alight at the Merlion Park station. It turns out the station was not right at the Merlion Park and the walk was just as long as the one from Esplanade! Anyway, the Merlion Park was a good place to cool-off with the fountains and the river around but no good for cameras! After some shots, we went off to cool off in the Starbucks under the bridge 😊 I’m not a big Starbucks fan but since we don’t have them here in Perth, then might as well have one.

Giving up on the HoHo, we walked from the Merlion Park to Funan Digital Mall instead. I was just about to fall on my feet with exhaustion but it was an interesting walk nevertheless, allowing you glimpses of the old colonial buildings in Singapore. Shopping at Funan was a big success for Kim, not for any digital stuff, but for North Face shoes which he got at 60%!o(MISSING)ff for SGD100+.

We asked for directions going to Chinatown to finish our shopping for gifts and souvenirs. There are actually 2 MRT stations “nearby” going to Chinatown but going to the nearer one (Clarke Quay) was a long walk already so we decided to just go ahead and walk until Chinatown! Again, if we weren’t so exhausted already, the walk would have been really enjoyable. We passed by Boat Quay and Clarke Quay and arrived in Chinatown through its back doors 😊

At Chinatown, I was sales-talked by a Filipina into buying an expensive wooden comb, said to be therapeutic for the hair and scalp. I bought several shawls and Kim bought souvenirs for his staff. After our retail therapy, we went to Hannah’s place again to have a really great, Pinoy home-cooked meal of dried pusit and tokwa’t baboy 😊 Of course the drinking came after and we went home at 1AM or so. Upon arriving at the hotel, we immediately packed our stuff, showered and crashed to bed for our 9AM flight to Langkawi later that day. The first leg of our Asian trip is over 😊

P.S. After our entire trip, Kim said that it is Singapore that he enjoyed the most. I guess it’s not really because of the place but because we were with good friends and in a way, it was just like coming home 



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