SINGAPURA!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Hello everyone...it's been quite sometime since an update. I am currently in Amritsar, India, but finally have good internet connection and some time tonight to update since the Phi Phi Islands (my last post). Well, I returned back to Phuket after leaving the amazing Phi Phi Islands and just stayed there for the night. I left for Singapore via Singapore Airlines the next morning and arrived to a very hot and muggy climate. From the landing though, Singapore gave off the cleanliness feel. I literally couldn't get my mind off the airport in which I just landed, it was HUGE. I've never been in an airport this big, and now I can actually say I've been to quite a few airports, and this one wins for being the biggest. The next beautiful thing about Singapore was how transportation is not a problem at all if you use the subway. I actually went straight from the airport to my hostel via subway. My hostel was located at the Boonkeng subway stop, just past China Town and Little India, I guess you could say the center of Singapore.

My first night was a little mellow. I was still tired from my past week and a half in Thailand, so I was looking to relax during my 4 days in Singapore. The first night, I headed out by myself to grab some food at a relatively popular nightime place in Singapore, Orchard Road.

When getting off at the Orchard Road subway station, you walk out of that egg shaped structure in the bottom of this picture. It was a really cool exit and you immediately walk into a huge crowd of people and lights everywhere

The next day I decided to head out around all of Singapore Island. The Island is really not that big and the subway makes its way around all of it. I literally finished the Island in about 5 hours, stopping at a variety of different stops that I thought were interesting/suggested by all the tour guides I have. I can definately say that Singapore is a very beautiful country with a good amount of diversity. Whether you're in the northern part of the southern part (main area) of the island, you still see a mixture of not just Chinese, but Indian, British and more. Through my Island tour though, I was really amused by the various advertisements posted around the country. Asian advertisements in general are pretty funny (i.e. product advertisements, mcdonalds, etc), but Singapore had some good ones. Here's a couple that I saw, some people will probably not even look twice, but I just thought they were random...

Thanks Kevin Costner

There were a lot of hygiene related ads, this one was disgusting...good idea I guess.

The hostel I stayed at was called the Drop Inn. The people there were very nice and the accomodation was nice as well. I met a few people there from all over the world. Myself and another hostel mate named Felix, from Germany, decided to do the China town and Little India walk one day. We basically took the subway to China Town and then walked up from there to Little India and then finally walked up to our Hostel, all in all, it takes about 5 hours. China Town was amazing. This seemed like one of the bigger China Town's I've ever seen, maybe besides the on in NYC. The food here is priced really well and delicious. 

Walking over this bridge from subway stop to take us into Chinatown

Just one of the colorful streets in China Town

In the middle of Chinatown is this beautiful Buddhist temple that has been there for some time but got renovated fairly recently. Went inside and took some pictures and happened to walk in during what looked like a prayer session. The art inside was beautiful and the colors were amazing. Here are a few pics

Video from inside the temple

One of things that ran through my mind when I landed in Singapore was if I even landed in the right country. From the minute I stepped off the plane, there were Indians everywhere. The security guards at the airport were Indians and the immigration guys were Indians...so I'm not surprised that they have their own designated neighborhood titled Little India in Singapore. All in all, Little India was pretty busy as well. It was a little dirtier than China Town, but the food was good there so we decided to grab a bite. We went to a South Indian restaurant (almost all Indian restaurants in Singapore are South Indian due to the large Tamilian population) and had Thali's (an Indian food item where there will be different cups with all types of curry provided). My german friend told me later that it was his first time eating Indian food, so that explains why he was in almost tears from the spice...I felt pretty bad.

Felix, if you're reading this, I'm sorry! In his defense though, they did make the food pretty spicy, it was good.

A very popular Hindu temple located in Little India

 
So, I had already seen much of Singapore and was still scheduled to stay for a few more days. The plan was initially to head to Bali, but I canceled that as well due to the heat. Most people may think I'm crazy for not going, but so far in SE Asia I've been roaming around all these places in 100+ degree temperatures. Bali was going to be just as hot and instead of doing tourist related things, I'd just be sitting on the beach. The only good thing is that I could probably DJ at some place. At this point, I was over the beaches (did it all in Thailand) and instead decided to follow the explorer side in me (which is gradually getting stronger) and get a head start on my next stop, India. I changed my flight date to Mumbai a few days early and headed for Mumbai, India.

 Bye Bye Singapore

Still couldn't get over how big this airport was. This is the domestic section...

Video from inside the airport...

Ok, Ok, enough about the airport. The next stop was India...and boy did it hit from the minute I landed.