We were in Singapore from the 7th until the 12th visiting Evan's bff and best man, Deepa. Our flight got us in around 1am on the 7th, so we took a quick tour of Deepa's neighborhood (Robertson Quay) before crashing and sleeping in until 10am.
Deepa didn't have to be into work until after lunch, so we had a lazy morning and then checked out his office. He then gave us a quick tour of the surrounding complex which was my (Michelle) first taste of crazy malls in Asia. We had lunch at the food court amid all the craziness and then caught a cab back to his place where we relaxed until he got home from work. The evening was pretty simple with a walking tour of Clarke and Boat Quay and dinner at a terrific Indian restaurant with a great view of the downtown skyline.
Staying with Deepa is a curlers paradise, so we slept in again on Saturday morning. When we finally woke up we trekked towards Orchard Road. Along the way we stopped at a Buddhist temple and were in awe of the magnificent golden Buddhas that were at the temple.
We soon learned not to take our malaria medicine on an empty stomach as Evan quickly became sick to his stomach after a whiff of incense. We booked it to a 7-11 (they are everywhere here) to get some crackers and sprite and all was fine after about 20 minutes, but the lesson was learned.
We went to a post office to send some souvenirs home. We took advantage of the cheap prices of the "slow boat" and who knows, we might even beat it home. We had lunch at another popular food court and then went to Chinatown.
We passed on some explicit snuff bottles which Evan is now regretting, but I'm sure we'll find them again on our trip. There were Buddhist artifacts that ranged in price from $500 to $300,000. It was like being in a museum where everything was for sale.
From Chinatown we went to Little India where we didn't see too much except a Hindu temple that was pretty amazing.
We then cruised over to the famous Raffles hotel, spotting this advert along the way. Tell me that's not Troy Bode's signature. Troy, if you read this please let us know.
At the Raffles I had the Singapore Sling and the boys drank beer and ate peanuts. The SS was quite good, but at $18 a drink one was enough.
The rest of our evening was spent enjoying EPL soccer at a bar and grabbing dinner at a brew pub (boys had burgers, I had potato skins...I was craving western food).
Sunday was the laziest of days where the highlight was an afternoon BBQ and watching Pulp Fiction. Deepa had to go to work on Monday, so Evan and I decided to brave the rain and go to the zoo. It was raining so hard that we didn't take any photos, but the layout was pretty cool and our favorite animals were the pygmy hippos, white tigers, chimps, polar bears and a Mandrill monkey (has a blue and red face and a blue butt). After drying off we went to a belgian bar for happy hour. The Stella was only $9 instead of $15...what a deal! Such a huge difference between the prices of Singapore and Bali!
We spent Tuesday morning taking advantage of Deepa's surf station and planned our stays in Thailand and Cambodia. We met Deepa for lunch and tied up some loose ends before the last supper (delivery pizza) and then flew to Phuket early the next morning.
One other note, Singapore is a very clean city that looks out for the well being of all. There are the typical signs on the subway that say no smoking, drinking, firearms, etc but this one also says no durian. Durian is a smelly fruit that would stink up the entire subway (and according to Deepa doesn't taste too good either).
A big thank you to Deepa for opening his place to us. Evan was grateful to have the chance to revive their college language of curling. Also, we both appreciated learning some of Singapore's dialect. Here's an example, lah. Do you think we could go to dinner and then get drinks? Can, can, lah. Pretty much just add lah to the end of every sentence and don't overcomplicate things when a simple "can" will do.
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