Singapore: Episode II

The following day we made our way down to Clarke Quay and had a little gander. The first day we spent in Singapore I thought to myself “This isn’t as hot as I expected. I think Kaohsiung is hotter than this!”. Well by this point in our trip I was regretting those thoughts! Much of our day actually consisted of getting from A to B and then being so hot and tired that we would pause for an hour in the shade before moving on from B to C. 

Instead of walking around Clarke Quay and Boat Quay in the blistering sun we decided to take a riverboat cruise... more efficient, less walking and OUT OF THE SUN! The buildings, old and new, were all impressive and the cruise also took us past the Singapore Merlion (Singa-Laut in Malay). The Merlion is a mythical creature with the body of a fish and the head of a lion. It is a symbol of Singapore and often used as a mascot of the city. 

On the riverboat cruise

You might not be able to tell but there is a Merlion hiding behind my head.

The Singapore Merlion

Afterwards we walked over to the Marina Bay Sands resort which consists of three towers and a SkyPark shaped like a boat sitting atop the three. The resort is a casino, hotel and very fancy mall. The SkyPark boasts some amazing 360 views of Singapore as well as a large infinity pool (for hotel guests only) and bars and restaurants, some of which the public can access (after paying for admittance to the SkyPark). Amanda & I enjoyed alcoholic beverages at the SkyPark bar, once again seeking some shelter from the sun. 

Amanda with the Singapore Flyer in the background

Amanda in front of the Marina Bay Sands Resort

Inside the Marina Bay Sands shopping mall

View from the Marina Bay Sands SkyPark

View from the Marina Bay Sands SkyPark

Once we had our fill (one each) of extraordinarily expensive beverages, we made our way to UE Square to meet my friend Wai Shun again. He suggested that we go out for some Singapore seafood at a restaurant called Long Beach, located at Dempsey, a popular location with Singaporeans that has a large variety of restaurants, pubs and bars. The meal was great and we shared the company of Wai Shun, his wife, daughter, sister-in-law and niece. Two foods we tried worth noting were chili crab, a Singaporean specialty, and fried whole baby squid in a kind of barbecue sauce. This also proved to be the first time Amanda has eaten crab directly out of the shell. I do believe she enjoyed it. After dinner Wai Shun, Amanda and I walked through Dempsey’s and found a pub where we shared a few beers and had some good conversation to cap off the night. 

Chili Crab. Photo by Flickr user: yoodz

For our last day in Singapore, in the morning we enjoyed a final meal at Whampoa Makan Place, the outdoor food court that Amanda and I had come to love. We agreed it was a good thing that we didn’t live in Singapore because with such a wide variety of readily available and cheap food we certainly wouldn’t lose any weight, if anything we would put on a few pounds! Worth mentioning that despite many things being very expensive in Singapore, the outdoor food courts were still very reasonably priced and affordable. An excellent place to eat and not break the bank at the same time. 

After lunch we decided to return to Sentosa Island. There is so much to do on the island that we felt like we had missed a great deal on our first day there. This time round we spent our time at the Underwater World and at the beach. Underwater World was very well stocked with a wide variety of fish but I think it was even more well stocked with an even wider variety of tourists!!! By the end of our time there I definitely got a feeling for what it is like to be in a massive school of fish with no choice but to follow the herd - or school in this case. The best part of our time at Underwater World was the outdoor performance with two pink dolphins and two sealions. 

Pink dolphins at Sentosa Underwater World

Seahorse

Amanda on a beach on Sentosa Island

Sentosa Island has a number of man-made beaches. Believe it or not, the sand was all imported!!

In the evening we met up with Wai Shun and headed to East Coast Park for dinner. As one might deduce, East Coast Park is a park that runs along Singapore’s east coast, it also is the location of a number of outdoor food courts and restaurants, popular in the evening time, but apparently priced a little higher just based on their location. 

Wai Shun and I walked around briefly investigating some stalls and foods while Amanda guarded an empty table we found near the beach front. For dinner we ordered a veritable feast which included stingray with chili sauce, clams with chili sauce, bamboo clams, grilled calamari with chili sauce, seafood with noodles, steamed bok choy, rojak with dried cuttlefish (rojak is a mix of vegetables and pinapple in a sweet sauce), you tiao (fried dough) and bean curd with lettuce with sweet sauce and a chili sauce for dipping. As you may have noticed, there were quite a few dishes that incorporated chili!!! The food was really great, especially the bamboo clams and the stingray. It was also nice getting to spend our last evening with Wai Shun, a friend I hadn’t seen since the beginning of the year when he left Canada to return to Singapore. 

Wai Shun is a braver man than I, wearing a white shirt in front of a table with so much chili sauce!!!

We really enjoyed our time in Singapore and four days was a good duration to explore some of the main attractions. 

I’m happy to say that our entry back into Taiwan went as planned. We were issued with a new 90-day visa exempt entry and we are now preparing to head up to Taipei on the 25th so we can squeeze in a few days of sightseeing before we start our training & orientation on August 1st. Amanda and I are excited and a little nervous to start teaching on the 15th of August, but most of all we are eager to find out what city we will be assigned to. Our first choice was Kaohsiung, followed by Taichung and then Hsinchu. We won’t find out which city we are assigned to until the first week of August and although we are sure we will have fun no matter where we end up, we will certainly miss the friends and the city we have come to know during our time in KH.

Weekend in Singapore!

Breakfast Friday morning was a ripe dragon fruit given to us by Jenny and Milton. I’ve never eaten this before coming to Taiwan, but it is my new favourite thing. It’s a food that seems like it shouldn’t exist outside the pages of a Sci-fi novel. It’s something they’d serve on Star Trek. I love it. See photo below.

Dragon fruit

Friday was spent almost entirely in transit between Kaohsiung and Singapore. First, we took Taiwan High Speed Rail to Taoyuan, just south of Taipei. The tickets are a bit expensive at about NT $1300, but the experience is so efficient and comfortable. From the Taoyuan THSR station it’s just a quick shuttle bus to the Taoyuan Airport. Our flight was delayed by two hours and the line for a cab at Changi Airport was nearly an hour long, so by the time we arrived at our hotel in Singapore it was about 3 in the morning. Oie.

We crawled out of bed Saturday morning in time to have lunch with Brett’s Singaporean former colleague, Wai Shun, along with his wife, Mei, and their tiny adorable daughter. They drove us to a Singapore-style food court. These are roofed, permanent structures covering rows of stalls and tables. The stalls all have big signs advertising their specialties: drinks, rice, noodles, seafood, vegetarian dishes, fried snacks, or sweets. The blend of European, Malay, Indian, and Chinese influences in Singapore’s local cuisine means there’s a lot of variety and a lot of spice! We tried Hainanese chicken rice (a local specialty), along with stir-fried dishes involving “carrot cake” (a glutinous food made from radishes), noodles, rice, veggies, and delicious sauce. We also tried yu tiao (sticks of fried dough) as well as some tasty pancakes filled with red bean paste and peanut butter. SO GOOD. Brett didn’t photograph this meal as I was in way too much of a hurry to shovel it all into my face.

After lunch Wai Shun and Mei took us to Chinatown to wander around. It’s a very busy area crammed full of stalls trying to take a slice of the tourist pie. Before we parted ways for the afternoon, Wai Shun and Mei pointed out a booth selling durian, the tropical fruit famous for its unappetizing odour. Durian is banned from Singapore’s MRT stations because the smell is so pungent and clings to the air for hours... So obviously we had to try it.

Brett & Amanda in Chinatown

Brett & Wai Shun

I thought the durian’s flesh itself actually looked a lot like raw chicken or something. The fruit contains multiple large seeds, about the size of a large peach pit. Once you’ve put on your disposable plastic glove - I’m not kidding - you grab a segment of the durian surrounding one seed and just pop it into your mouth. My first thought was “How will I swallow this?” and I have to admit I panicked a little while my mouth was completely full of durian with Wai Shun and Mei looking eagerly on to see what I thought. Over the summer, Brett and I have tried some very unusual foods, but I’m having a hard time describing what that durian was like. The flesh felt like extremely ripe, stringy mango that had what almost felt like a fine skin holding it all together. Once you scrape the flesh off the pip and spit it out, the taste of the durian remains in your mouth for hours! Wai Shun and Mei provided us with coconut juice which we gratefully chugged to (unsuccessfully) wash away the taste. I would try durian again, but perhaps next time with my nose plugged. I think the smell overwhelmed my senses so I couldn’t enjoy the taste of the fruit on its own. Brett thinks durian blended with milk would be a nice drink, but that remains to be seen.

Forbidden on the Singapore MRT!!!

The place you get the plastic gloves from is the same place you get the durian!!!

Wai Shun and Mei left to go run some errands, and we walked around Chinatown for a while longer. We saw a beautiful Hindu temple unlike anything I've seen before. We also found a store devoted entirely to Tin Tin merchandise! B was so excited! It was also hilarious and exciting to be harassed by Chinatown tailors as we walked back through on our way to catch a train: "Hey where you from? You come here I make you a fine suit!"

Hindu temple in Singapore

After that, Brett and I caught the MRT to Orchard Road, a bustling street famous for its enormous malls. After an afternoon of walking through huge crowds of shoppers and tourists we headed to the Singapore Zoo for their famous Night Safari! This was truly a highlight of the trip. For $64, the two of us got tickets for entry and the tram. Before heading into the park we got to take in a fire-breathing show and wander through some beautiful shops and restaurants. The line for the tram was quite long, but once you’re on it’s a pleasant 40-minute ride around spotlit animal exhibits. There aren’t any fences or barriers between the tram and the animals. The closest thing to a boundary are moats protecting onlookers from big cats or a hedge keeping us out of the way of a rhino. The tram often passed within inches of grazing herds of animals. So cool! I also found it impressive that there were animals visible in every exhibit. There was none of that annoying craning and hoping to see something that was too shy to come out. All the animals were relaxing and hanging out in full view of the path. There were also walking paths where you could go to get a closer look. My favourite of the night was a beautiful pregnant leopard! I highly recommend this experience.

Lion on the night safari at the Singapore Zoo

After the Night Safari we got some extremely overpriced Singapore Slings and chicken skewers and called it a day! Gin is usually counted as one of the many things that make me throw up almost immediately, but it went down rather smoothly. The fact that it was mixed with Cherry Heering, Benedictine, and fresh pineapple juice probably didn’t hurt! We would soon learn that drinks are pricey almost everywhere in Singapore due to high taxes on alcohol.

Amanda with a Singapore Sling

Brett with a Singapore Sling & Satay Chicken

On Sunday morning we walked to a food court near our hotel for more delicious and affordable local fare. While the place was as busy and hectic as a Taiwanese night market, we had the advantage of being able to read what everything was on the English signage!

There was a huge variety of foods available at the outside food courts.

After brunch, we took the MRT to the Harbour Front where we caught the Singapore Cable Car to Sentosa Island. Sentosa is a recently developed resort area with beautiful man-made beaches, hotels, games, and attractions. We sat and sipped cool drinks (our favourite Singapore pastime), went up a rotating sky tower for beautiful panoramic views, ate ice cream (my second favourite Singapore pastime), and generally wandered around. I also posed for a photo while holding a beautiful but terrifying python at the behest of my loving partner who insisted “it will be way more impressive if you do it than if I do”... Thanks, honey!

Sentosa Island is undergoing a great deal of development. It hosts a casino, man made beaches, Universal Studios, roller coasters and more.

Brett & Amanda on the Sentosa Tiger Tower

The Sentosa Merlion replica

Happy or having a heart attack?

After Sentosa, we took a look around a huge mall called VivoCity and we met up with our landlord who is living with his Taiwanese wife and two sons in Singapore. He took us to their house where we were served an amazing home cooked meal along with fresh-squeeze lemon juice. It was great to sit around the table and talk about life in Taiwan, Scotland, Singapore, and Canada with such interesting and friendly people. We received lots of advice about life in Taiwan! Dinner with our landlords was a very special experience that helped make Singapore a trip to remember!

It’s hard to sum up my half of the Singapore trip and I’m sorry this post was so long. I fear that Brett’s may be even longer... you know how verbose he can be. He should have his post about Monday/Tuesday in Singapore up in the next couple of days. Until then, he and I will be doing tons of laundry and nursing our peeling sunburns.