Sparkling Singapore

Trip Start May 03, 2008
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Trip End May 02, 2009


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Flag of Singapore  ,
Monday, July 14, 2008

From the dirty and downtrodden to sparkling surfaces and skyscrapers, what a difference a day makes. Every two months in South Asia, Singapore was a small shock to system but a pleasant one. After we landed at the airport, we took the MRT (underground train) and tried to find our accommodation. We were staying in Chinatown and after a bit of searching we found our place which was in a tower block of flats. Our dorm was part of a three room flat where twelve beds were crammed into one room. In saying that though travelling on a budget there are very few options in Singapore and the owner of the "hostel" was lovely. He was an old doctor whose father was a famous photographer in Singapore called Yip Cheong-Fun. He showed us some of the photographs and the story behind them and they were beautiful. He ran a museum of his father works in Chinatown but unfortunately we didn't have enough time to visit.
 
Women would love Singapore; men would like it too as long as they had money Singapore
Singapore
 . Singapore is about shopping. There are large shopping centres on every block some centres just specialising in certain clothes or just computers anything you like. The main shopping road is Orchard Road which has a shopping centre every second building. On a budget though it was look but don't buy mentality. On the second day we went to a Computer Shopping Centre and I picked out a bargain laptop for Marie Therese for half the price you would get at home.
 
We visited the famous Raffles Hotel home of the creation of the cocktail, the Singapore Sling. It was a big let down. The hotel itself was beautiful surrounded by sports cars with an early twentieth century foyer which we looked around for the few minutes. At the side and the back of the hotel is the bar where you can get your Singapore Sling and I've got to say it was disgustingly dirty there, the only dirty place we saw in the whole of Singapore. There were broken peanut shells scattered all over the floor and the cocktails were overpriced at thirteen Euro each.
 
During the day and at night we zipped around on the MRT which was really handy and easy to traverse. That night we caught one to harbour and watched the lights of the skyscrapers illuminated on the water. That is not to say that Singapore was all buildings either, there were plenty of parks and green spaces and traffic wasn't too bad so you didn't suffer from a smog induced coughing fit like some other capital cities.
 
One negative though was the price of alcohol, it even more expensive than back home which is a first. We were a little sad to leave Asia but next stop was the land of Oz, the reason we went travelling in the first place.
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