Sherlock Holmes

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Like most mornings, I began my day blogging. Since Fred and I made plans to get breakfast at a Kopitium (Singapore's special coffee shops), I chose to tide myself over with a pleasant can of mango juice. While I expected the cool refreshing taste, I did not realize that it contained chunks of mango in it. A great surprise to start off my morning and made me wish it was available in the United States. I think I may be looking for an Asian grocery store back home - which may be a bit tricky living in Texas.
Fred and I started the morning at Ya Kun Koya Toast, the Kopitium recommended by the Taiwanese girl we road back to Chinatown with after the night safari. It was not quite up to par with the Toast Box (our original Kopitium experience), we both enjoyed trying Koya, a sweetened coconut butter. I had mine with French Toast and a Teh-C (the tea mixed with sugar and evaporated milk). It was too sweet for Fred, so lucky me, I was able to finish off his toast!
Our first scheduled stop was at the FZD School of Design that was the inspiration for Fred to visit Singapore. He began watching Feng Zhu, the school originator, in YouTube design instructional videos three years ago. Feng Zhu excited a drive to design in Fred. Being ahead of schedule to the school opening time, we took a detour through Clarke Quay and stumbled upon Fort Canning Park. This huge hill had a pathway called the "14 Century Walk" that was lined with historical tidbits about Singapore. At the peak of the hill sat a water reservoir for the city. The path eventually led us to a historical area that had the Raffle's House and Fort Canning Lighthouse (originally a communication center in 1819 for the British Port). From the park, we walked down to the canal and followed the path along the restaurants housed in Clarke Quay. Unfortunately, it was too early in the day for any of them to be open. We were extremely lucky on our first day in Singapore when it was cloudy and a bit misty, but kept us cool as we hoofed it all over the city. Today just a small walk through a park (yes, a bit hilly) early in the morning had us glistening! A short stop at the mall after Clarke Quay with some waters went a long way to cooling us down.
Eventually, we were back on the road hunting down the address to FZD School of Design. It seems the majority of Singaporean time is spent either shopping in malls or eating based on the number of establishments we have been seeing. After cutting through a couple more malls, Fred and I made it to FZD School of Design's address. Inside we hopped on the elevator and took it to the 4th floor in accordance with the map in the lobby. At the top, the two doors (two sided elevator) opened to the fantastic view of grey drywall. Confused we tried level 3 with no better luck, so then went down to level 2 with the same results! Back on the ground floor, befuddled we stared at the map in contemplation of our next move. Using our powers of deduction, as if we were Sherlock Holmes (each time we have succeeded in noticing something on our trip, we tend to reference him), Fred and I concluded that the colors populated on the OTHER side of the map from our lobby were the appropriate rooms. Returning outside and walking around the building, we passed the Singapore Taxi Academy (no wonder the government isn't too thrilled about Uber) and entered Lobby #2. Trying the elevator up to the 4th floor one more time, we succeeded in making to to FZD School of Design.
It took approximately 2 seconds after stepping into the school for Fred to start geeking out. An admissions employee named Lily joined us to share information about the school and talk us through the day of a student. She took us on a tour of the building. Knowing next to nothing about the school, I had only previous college experiences to draw on as expectations.Little did I realize that the extent of the tour would be one floor with a lobby and offices plus another floor with only 3 (all-be-it large) classrooms. Apparently, FZD School of Design is a single year conceptual design school taught by founder and designer Feng Zhu. This famous designer accepts 38 students for three class cohorts per year. Fred was so overwhelmed and excited by our visit that at one point he told Lily "I don't even know what to say right now." I don't think I have ever heard Fred speechless before! Lily offered Fred an opportunity to purchase a signed copy of FZD book full of designs from over the years. Unfortunately, we did not have enough cash, so we hunted an ATM down at a nearby mall. We parted ways afterward to accomplish more to get the rest of our day moving. While Fred returned to purchase the book, I headed back to Chinatown to acquire gifts.
On my walk back, I noticed a couple who sounded like Australian tourists trying to get directions form a local. Through our past couple days, I noticed that while English is a main language in Singapore, many people still don't speak it well or even at all. Lucky for them, I had been hording maps from each place we visited. I ran back to give them one that had the most tourist information on it (including hotels and shopping malls). Hopefully it helped! Eventually I made it back to Chinatown where I enjoyed browsing the stands for fun stuff to bring home! I also utilized the opportunity to enjoy one more delicious meal from the Chinatown Food Street!
Upon my return to the hostel, Fred and I packed up our stuff to move on to our impulse for the trip - Marina Bay Sands Hotel. Two metro stops later, we were giddy waiting in line for our new room. Fred was randomly selected to skip the line and get express check in, so we were soon hurrying up to our 31st floor room. The room was very nice and quite cute (things are just a bit smaller in Asia) and had an amazing view of the Gardens by the Bay. It took no more than five minutes for us to get changed and move on up to the pool on the 57th floor roof. From the crystal clear infinity pool we had a breathtaking view of the downtown skyline. We spent the sweltering hot afternoon cooling off in the pool, enjoying the view, sipping Pina Coladas (mine didn't last long enough to get a picture), and chatting with other tourists. We sat on lounge chairs in the water next to a woman on an overnight layover between her home in California and business in India. She sure was making the most of that break! Another pair we chatted with were in the US Navy temporarily stationed in Singapore while on deployment to Japan. The two guys were from Texas (his ya'll caught my attention) and California. Despite our sunscreen we began to burn a bit, so returned to our room by mid-afternoon. This gave us the chance to change and head across the street to explore the Gardens by the Bay.
This newly completed section of Singapore contained 13 outdoor gardens surrounding a giant metal tree grove along with two air-conditioned special exhibit domes. Melting from our walk around the outdoor gardens, we entered the Flower Dome first to cool down. It featured many local flowers and a "Tulip" theme that tied different tulips with Disney stories & fairy-tales. I spent the trip singing along to the Disney music being played and over indulged in pictures filled with colorful flowers. I got really excited at the Snow White location due to the mirror positioning. I convinced the Asian couple next to me to let me get a picture of them (on their camera) where you saw the two of them reflected within the mirror. Then I drug Fred over to try it. We moved on to dome #2, Cloud Dome, where a gigantic mountain structure towered above us covered in flowers, plants, and waterfalls. We went straight to the top and followed the walkway path down and around the mountain. Inside the mountain there were different aspects of plant and planet life through time. It had an interesting section devoted to caves and the very bottom was devoted to describing the planet problems we currently are facing and going into the impact global warming could possibly have by 2100 if left unchecked. At this point in time the Earth's temperature is approximately 0.5 degrees Celsius (0.9 F) more than it has been in the past. If things continue this direction, by 2100 it will be 5 degrees Celsius (9 F) warmer. The entire Gardens by the Bay was designed to be sustainable. The set-up captures rainwater to irrigate the gardens automatically, natural bio fuel drives a generator that cools the domes as well as fertilizes the plants, and the giant trees have solar panels to store the electricity that lights them up each night. It is an incredible design.
Hot and sweaty again from our return trip to the hotel, Fred and I freshened up to go out for a nice dinner at the hotel. We returned to the top floor with the intention of eating at the restaurant there. After finding out that it required a $168 minimum EACH, we changed our mind pretty quickly. As luck may have it, we did get up there just as the sun was setting. After some finagling of my camera settings, Fred set it up so we could capture the vibrant red and orange color of the sun over the city skyline. Still hungry, we returned to the Hotel Galleria - another mall but quite large and highly expensive - that sits out front and below the hotel sitting right on the bay. We found a pleasant Italian-Japanese Fusion restaurant right on the walkway by the Marina Bay. It offered a great view of the city skyline, bay, and all the Singaporeans out running. After dealing with walking around in the heat all day, I could completely understand waiting until after dusk to go running there! Dinner and drinks were finished up just in time for us to make it over to the Marina Bay Sands water light show.There was extensive use of fog with projected images along with large light beams across the bay and bubbles to create an incredible affect for the audience. The up-beat music accompany it had you smiling by the end and walking away singing "What a Wonderful World". Rarely do you see that caliber of show for free!
Afterward, Fred and I meandered around the bay to see the original Merlion Statue. The Merlion has been adopted by Singapore as the national personification of Singapore. The fish body represents Singapore's origin as a fishing village when it was called Temasek, which means "sea town" and the lion head represents Singapore's original name - Singapura -meaning "lion city." On the way, the full moon came out and gave some amazing opportunities to capture the city skyline at night. To close out our food adventures, Fred bought a street vendor ice cream sandwich. While normal colorful white bread was an option to make the sandwich, he conservatively opted for the wafers. I, on the other hand, snagged an Asian snowcone! It was sugar water shaved ice covered with lychee fruits and flavored jellies. Due to an early flight to Tokyo the next morning, we called it a night after that.

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