Singapore

My sister and I made a stop-over in Singapore in May 2004 on my way to India to celebrate my grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. My memories of Singapore are a bit blury, considering that I am writting this blog nearly 4 years later. The primary reason for the visit was that Singapore airline offered a great deal for the stop-over, hotels, gift coupons, entry into major attractions for only $50 a day!! It was a great deal to pass up on. We stayed for 2 days.

We arrived on Singapore airlines flight late at night and after 2 hours of immigration, baggage pickup, security checks, ticket checks and alot of waiting we reached our hotel in Singapore.

Day1:
Knowing me, we got up early and left for Bird Park. There were lots of birds, more bird and then some. (what do you expect from a bird park....duh). Ok, there was a VERY wide variety of them, but thats what I'd expect from a zoo. There were bird shows also, but nothing mind blowing here.

Next stop was Insect park. Nnow, this was something interesting. They had quite a variety. the park had many sections/enclosures each with different kind/species/variety of insects - the crawling kind, the flying kind, the creepy kind, the wierd ones, the exotic ones, etc etc. You have to see to beleive this park! The one that really caught my eye, was the butterfly enclosure - We entered into a huge net where the butterflies were set free!! All kinds of em, and we were free to walk amongt them and even touch them! There were cages that houses larve in different stages on metamorphosis to become butterflies. In fact, in the last cage, the butterflies were actually breaking out of their cacoons even as we watched and caretaker was helping the tourists touch and feel the new born butterfly!!! This was a too good of an experience.

Day 2: Today we went to Santosa Island. Ok, first things first, I am from LA. So, spectacular beaches are no novelty. May be thats why I wasn't in awe of Santosa Island as some people had told me. Beautiful beach, entertainment on the beach, a dolphin show as some salient features of Santosa - nothing new to me. Although,2 things did catch my eye - The cable car to Santosa and the laser show in the evening. The cable car brings visitors from mainland Singapore to the the island. We got the cable car with the glass floor to enjoy the heights. It was too good! But the laser show took the crown for the best attraction at Santosa. Its magnificiant. If you've seen the 'Fantasmic' parade at Disneyland and you think its the best show, you ain't see anything yet. Highly recommend doing the laser show at Santosa.

However, the best was yet to come! We went to the 'Night Safari'. This is simply the most amazing zoo I have ever been. Firstly it open at sundown and remains open until midnight. The wild animals are in the open in their own habitiat seperated from the crowd by glass or deep trenches or water. Lions, tigers, hieans, wolfs, you name - all noctornal animals in their own habitait is a wonderfful experience. Moreover, the atmosphere is built up via lowlighting, high grass, dense trees. Its really scary. Its like being in the wild and for a minute I forgot the animals can't cross over and get to me. I was scared out of my wits.

Day 3: Today was our last day in Singapore but we our flight out wasn't until later in the afternoon. So we decided to go around the city and visit "little India". We changed couple of trains to get there. The public transport in Singapore is awesome! and Little India was everything we had heard about - small shops, street vendors (hawkers), food stalls, sales man yelling outside their shops, open air cooking everything you'd see in a busy street outside a train station in Mumbai. It was so surreal -it was as if we were in mumbai!! Even the train station looked so much like a a local train station in Mumbai - I swear to God it was so wierd. We walked 3/4 miles to Mustafa, the famous and the biggest Indian super store in Singapore. It was nice - like a BigBazzar or something. We didn't shop much, it was weekend and it was packed.

Finally, we took the hotel shuttel to the airport . I was told Singapore airport is amazing- I'd say it is better than most airports, lot of shopping, lot of entertainment but again I was impressed but not blow away or anything. Best thing I liked was free Internet Kiosks!! I was able to check my mail after 3 days.

Some Side Notes:
Singapore has a tropical weather. i.e. its hot all the time and March is beginning of a very hot summer there. As for me, we had just about wrapping up winter in US. The heat and humidity killed me! The weather so sultry and like typical tropical climate, it rained at midday. Me and my sister were sapped most of hte time.

Singapore is safe, I was told, at the airport, at the htoel and even by a taxi driver. A woman taxi driver told us on the first day in Singapore that we shouldn't worry about being cheated in here. Although, on our way over to Night Safari from Santosa, the taxi driver charged us almost twice the usual fare. We didn't know any better until we took a ride back to the hotel and found out how low the fare actually should be. So, even on the safest place on Earth, one should be careful I suppose. Having said that, I must add here that on our way to Night Safari, my sister and I both slept in the taxi. It was about 9/10pm and the taxi driver could have easily robbed up. That we got away with only paying double fare, makes we feel we didn't have it so bad after all.

Also, going around Singapore is easy. Maps, cheap taxi, good public transport makes for an easy travel. It also helps that everyone speaks English. I liked Singapore, for a small country it does pack a lot of entertainment.