Since we had just a single day left in Singapore we decided to do nothing but shop, shop, shop and shop some more.

By this time we had narrowed down our two favorite shopping places in Singapore - one was Simlin Square - because it’s every techy person’s heaven:

And the other - as I’ve mentioned earlier somewhere - was my personal favorite - the department store OGs.

So between Simlin & OGs we went. And back. Yes, there are lots of floors in each place.

We had decided to have a traditional Laksa & one of us did - but I’m sorry to say it wasn’t me; my appetite for junk food was so unsatiated the past couple of days that I really couldn’t resist getting into the nearest Burger King. Was good!

The next day we headed into Serangoon…

… where I amused myself by getting my picture taken near these:

The website ChennaiBest.com describes Serangoon as a “home away from home” - and yes, Singapore is not only filled with Chennai origined Indians, but it seems the majority of them live in Serangoon.

One of my friends had told me before going that I could buy amazing silk saris from here - but seriously people, I’m Indian and I ain’t shopping for no saris in Singapore.

Of course we did go back to Mustafas (which the aforementioned website calls the “Mecca of Indians” - I love the copy on that web, lol!) to add more weight to our already very very overweight bags.

Yes, we are Indian.

Had our last meal at the same place we had our first meal, oh, so so many days back - counting the cruise, it was over two weeks ago… how quickly time passes when you’re having fun.

The ride back to Changi was bittersweet. Even the Mercedes taxi did not cheer me up.

We finally reached Changi Airport - which is an experience in itself - check this out to see what all they offer.

And then we had to say bye.

Goodbye Singapore, you are truly unique.

If you love observing street architecture, quaint art & all sorts of chinese things from sling bags to ancient statues, then you absolutely must visit Chinatown in Singapore!

Chinatown is on the MRT and I was immediately hit by the profusion of bright color - a true delight to the eye!

Visit the Chinatown Heritage Center, a beautiful museum “chronicling how Chinatown came to be and the privation suffered by early migrants”.

We mainly walked the streets, taking in all the sights, sounds & smells (yes, there were tons of eateries all along the streets) of Chinatown.

We also saw the Sri Mariamman Temple, “Singapore’s oldest and most important Hindu temple and worth a visit for the intricately carved gopuram (statuary above the entrance), which gave adjacent “Pagoda Street” its name”

Lunch was an excellent local meal…lovely!

From Chinatown we headed to Dhoby Ghaut - which wikipedia informs us is a name “reminiscent of the famous Dhobi Ghat of Mumbai, India”. Yes, we know!

Dhoby Ghaut in Singapore actually is a very fancy place that is home to some of the bigger shopping malls like The Atrium and Plaza Singapura (technically both malls are on Orchard Road but are more easily accessed from Dhoby Ghaut MRT than MRT station marked Orchard).

Plaza Singapura is one of the more popular malls in Singapore (though really everywhere there are huge malls) and has retail outlets over seven floors and two basements.

From there it was over to Orchard Road for some more shopping (does it EVER end??!) & a quick bite

And then to Raffles Place and enjoyed the fabulous view that the Singapore River has to offer (see Clarke Quay in the background):

Especially the beautiful Cavenagh Bridge, one of the oldest bridges that spans the Singapore River.

Raffles Place, besides housing the enormous and absolutely breathtaking The Fullerton Hotel (this from someone who practically lives in 5 Star hotels) is the financial heart of Singapore.

Most of the buildings in Raffles Place are so high that even if you tilt your head to the maximum degree you can, you still won’t see the top of it - see my last pic if you don’t believe me!

By the time we got back, it was late and had started raining quite heavily - I didn’t know that it rained so much in Singapore in March but I soon find out that this is common for a tropic like Singapore.

To visit Singapore and not see Sentosa would be akin to visiting Agra and not seeing the Taj Mahal.

Sentosa, Singapore’s tourist focussed island is approx 5 kilometers and has a multitude of things a tourist can indulge in - from astounding natural attractions like the Animal, Bird, Butterfly, Insect, Dolphin lagoons and Underwater Worlds to amazing man-made wonders like the Carlsberg Sky Tower, 4D Magix, Flying Trapeze, the Lost Civilization, and the Luge & Skyride - to name but a few!!! The island is also home to the tallest Merlion in Singapore, the trademark symbol of Singapore.

You can get to Sentosa by various means such as the MRT, public/private buses, taxis/cars, the special Setosa express and of course, by cable cars. We happily chose the last option as that in itself seemed great fun!

We accessed the cable cars from Mount Faber (one could also get on at the HarbourFront) and we were simply blown away by the stunning beauty of the place! I definetely recommend you visit Mount Faber!

One can also experience what Mount Faber terms as “Sky Dining” - a fabulous customised fine dining experience 70 mtrs above the sea! And the cable cars themselves are all spruced up to add to the whole dining experience:

We of course took a regular cable car to travel to Sentosa. Each cable car had buttons which one could press - there were choice for language - and voila… a recording told us exactly what we were passing over at what time - very nice! The cable car literally goes through the building at the HarbourFront - you feel like you’re in an Arnie movie and about to smash into a building - whoa! Post the HarbourFront, I was also excited to get my very first glimpse of the Merlion… oh, how Singapore! The Merlion was the first & last attraction I saw on the island!

Once you reach Sentosa, you are armed with a Map which brilliantly locates every attraction on the island and lets you choose where you want to go and what you want to do. We actually went through the map the previous day - and I suggest you do the same, given the chance (you can pick up one free at Changi airport) - so that we could highlight exactly what we wanted to see and in what approximate order we’d do it, so as to get the maximum distance & attractions covered in the day.

The entire island is connected by buses and beach trams - all free of cost (there’s an entrace fee to the island as well as to most attractions in the island though). Both the buses & beach trams were extremely easy to use and color coded to show exactly where they were going.

(some of them even had cute guys in ‘em!)

There are also signs everywhere in the island to guide one to their chosen destination…

Like, The Fort Siloso Tour- loved this the best - got to know a lot about the history and heritage of Singapore. Besides the guided tour, they had “largest collection of World War II memorabilia with life-sized replicas, interactive exhibits and even authentic aromas are lovingly recreated, … more than 245 photographs, documents and film clips on display”.

Besides that, we also went to:

The Tanjong Beach & The Siloso Beach

Underwater World

The Sentosa Orchid Garden - Stunning!

The Lost Civilisation

The Artists Village

The Merlion & the Merlion Walk

Images of Singapore

and of course the Magical Sentosa (S$4-million sound, light and laser extravaganza at the Musical Fountain)

We came with our camera full, our spirits high & our bodies almost faith with exhaustion.

The last Sunday we were in Singapore, we went to the Church of St. Bernadette for Holy Mass, so this time we thought we’d worship at another church. We were recommended the Church of the Sacred Heart, which apparently is “one of the most beautiful Churches in Singapore”, complete with a ‘new’ Hammond organ (1941) and beautiful stained glass windows.

An additional luxury we enjoyed at this church was that the entire church was air-conditioned! The priest in attendance was an old man, Fr. Paul, who when we entered was busy teaching the congregation a new song. He was highly animated, swinging his hands to & fro & very enthused indeed - so good that I remember the tune till now!

After Mass, he invited us to share in an agape meal that the congregation was having specially that day. I tried to sample the very exotic looking “fish balls” but couldn’t really stomach anything. It was good to get a feel of a Singaporean Catholic Community - not very far removed from our own, all very happily talking among themselves and with the priest.

Before leaving we took a lot of pictures of the facade and around the building.

We decided to travel back by local bus as the stop was directly opposite the church. So far I was very impressed by the local transport I had used (taxis - regular & Mercedes and the MRT) and the bus turned out no exception. It was easy to pay - we learned that we could use the same tourist swipe cards that we used for the MRT - and also there was a little TV screen in the bus, in case the scenery bored one (which it didn’t me).
We stopped a little bit away from home at a local market and shopped till we were tired. Shopping at Singapore is terribly addictive indeed!

It was by this time late afternoon & we decided to take it easy & enjoy whatever we could of the final day India vs England test match in Nagpur. The match was drawn but it was pretty good anyway.

“Indian opening batsman Wasim Jaffer stroked his maiden hundred before the first test against England ended in an exciting draw on the final day on Sunday. ” More details here.

In the night the whole group of us decided to go to Wheelock Place, a place on Orchard Road which looks like a glass Christmas Tree all lit up in the night! Very pretty indeed!

The chosen place for dinner was ‘Fish & Co’ - I’ve already mentioned, I’ve had the best fish ever this holiday & this place certainly helped with that impression! Besides all the regular stuff, it also has a separate kiddie menu - yes, in the shape of little fishies. So cute.

Ordered a fish platter for myself and was a tad unsure about how to finish it off - see the size of the platter for yourself.

After dinner - where we all ate till we could eat no more - we decided to forget the car & instead take a nice long (& mainly digestive) walk down Orchard Road in the night.

Orchard Road by night is very different from the Orchard Road by day. For starters it’s all lit up with one massive display after another. Even the buildings are prettily lit up as if for a function. I enquired and found out that this is the way it is throughout the year - and on special occassions, it’s even better! Lovely!

With all the day’s adventures, a stomach full of food & a nice loooong walk, you can imagine that it wasn’t long before I fell asleep when we got home!

I got up knowing that we had lots planned for the day. Counting today made six more days in Singapore and I was determined to pack as much as I could in them.

First things first though. We purchased two Tourist MRT cards (our Mercedes taxi of the previous day wasn’t going to be feasible the entire trip!) Singapore is very well connected by MRT and everything is very systematically divided into four lines which are color coded. One can go from any point to another with no trouble at all.

Yes and the fact that I’m from India (need I even describe our packed beyond capacity trains) made me very impressed with everything – all the stations & all the trains being Air-Conditioned and everything being totally clean (of course you expect this in Singapore).

First on our day’s itinerary was the Singapore Science Centre. For that we had to travel all the way to Jurong East.

We were totally unprepared for the Science Center. We started off not really sure we’d like it - it seemingly was a place for young kids - but then…!!

It wasn’t long before we lost ourselves in the fantastic worlds of Aviation, Discovery, Chemistry, the Human Body, Energy and Space Science to name but a few.

You’d not even IMAGINE how amazingly fun these worlds are made in the Science center. There are 1000s of interative games and we found ourselves turned into little adventures & discoverers as we played and interacted in the so so many different fun innovative things we did.

We also managed to catch a special exhibition of Star Wars that they had.

The mission of the center is to:

To promote interest, learning and creativity in science and technology, through imaginative and enjoyable experience and contribute to the nation’s development of its human resource.

And, this, undoubtedly is more than accomplished. We could have spent the entire day at the center but it was a tad tiring - if you’re doing Singapore with kids I definetely suggest you keep a day aside for this.

After lunch and more shopping we retired home in the evening before our further adventures for the day.

What we did next was without doubt THE BEST thing of my entire Singapore trip and as such it wins my Pick of the Holiday Award!

Clarke Quay (pronounced Key for the uninitiated, lol)

Clarke Quay was so amazing I don’t know where to start! It’s on the banks of the Singapore River and “play host to a colourful kaleidoscope of restaurants, wine bars, entertainment spots and retail shops”

I loved the way the whole Quay was joined under a collage of tented-roof-like structure which had lights which changed ever so often changing the entire ambience of the place as it did… fabulous!

The Singapore Ministry of Sound is also here at the Quay and as you can see from the pic below the line to enter just went on and on and on and on….!!!

The advertising tag line of the Quay is “Wine. Dine. Good times” and it sure sure is!

Of course, the main reason I love Clarke Quay is because of the G-Max Reverse Bungy - Singapore’s first and only reverse bungy!!!

The Reverse bungy throws you up ‘200km per hour to a dazzling height of 60 meters (198 feet)! Experience up to five G-Forces forces similar to those experienced by astronauts in a rocket launch!!!’

The bungy seats three at a time & I went with this very cute Singapore chick E & her friend who great company on the crazy ride!

It was by far the craziest, most fabulous, ride of my life.

If I ever go back to Singapore, I’m going back to Clark Quay & I’m riding that bungy again!

We woke up fully rested and after another good breakfast we decided to pack up. We would check out by mid day & go back to my cousin’s place for another few days before returning home.

We decided to travel by a Mercedes Taxi (they’re more expensive than the already expensive taxis, but why not, lol?!) and a very comfy ride it was indeed.

For lunch we had among other things, nice exotic passion fruit. Spent most of the day sorting out our itinenary for the coming days with the help of my cousins, checking & sending emails (it had been a while!!) and even updated my (regular) blog with one pic of the Singapore Zoo.

Went for a looong and glorious swim (yes, in my sexy new bikini) – the rain didn’t deter me at all. Enjoyed the fact that I was alone in the pool & basically had a great time.

Later in the day decided to head down to East Coast Beach. It was a long drive and we got to see another part of Singapore that we hadn’t seen so far. Singapore basically isn’t all that big of a place & I think we did manage to cover most of it in the days we spent.

Back to the present, the East Coast Beach is the perfect place for family get-togethers. The beach is filled with things for parents and kids to do together like skating (on the paved portions of the beach) and bowling (in special alleys), BBQs (on the beach) etc.

By night the Marine Cove beach is all lit up & looks a bit like wonderland and sounds great too, every place that we passed either had live music or loud DJ music booming out from it. There were also lots of restaurants, fast food places, coffee shops and night clubs, so one could pick there choice of place to hang out it. We chose a coffee shop because we didn’t plan on waiting too long. Had some very good bitter chocolate which I think contributed a bit to the fact that I fell asleep on the way back home :¬)

Woke up pretty late & had an enormous breakfast at the breakfast buffet served at our hotel.

It was a day dedicated to shopping and dedicated we were. Singapore’s expensive compared to India but I guess on holiday it’ easy to get bitten by the shopping bug. We shopped, shopped and shopped. Oh did I mention we shopped? And then at the end of it all, we shopped some more. Lol.

Among the places we visited were Orchard Road – but naturally! Walking the streets in Singapore is such a pleasure! Everything is clean and green & seemingly made for walking shoppers. There are tons of TV like giant plasma displays all over with adverts and everything is so organized and properly done. There are also lots of phirangs all over the place which makes the average holiday-er fit right into it all.

We shopped at C. K. Tangs, which a friend insisted we “must” go to. The place was imo somewhat like the Oberoi Shopping Center (and is in fact in a five star hotel too). We were lucky at the time that there was a sale going on, though honestly it didn’t make too much of a difference, the prices were still exorbitant! Lol.

I was also impressed to see this sign proudly displayed outside:

We also went to the Wisma Atria (seen in the Singapore adverts) and Takashimaya a place recommended to my mum by a friend (also full of ridiculously exorbitant brands). It was here my mum made here royal purchase, don’t even ask.

We decided to change gears a bit and went to Bencoolen Street – to my mum’s favorite mall in Singapore – Simlim Square (which is different from Simlim Towers apparently). Both are known for the Electronic gadgets they sell and boy do they ever!!!

Floor after floor after floor of ever type of electronic gadget ever made and ever know to man, it’s a techy geek’s heaven.

We had lunch in Simlim Square at a small little foodie place called ‘Fred’s Café’. I couldn’t stomach the food - I actually hid some of it in my bag & threw it away later so as to not offend the proprietor, a Mr. Fred P. who sat down at our table with us & spoke to us at length about oh so many things. He was a very very nice gentleman, the type of person you’d meet for an hour & remember a lifetime.

After lunch I actually managed to persuade my mum to leave Simlim (wonders of wonders!!) and go to the other side of Bencoolen.

Here I discovered what was since my favorite place to shop in Singapore – OG. The mall has great brands which were perfect for my wallet. I’m not a shopper by any stretch of imagination but even I went mad here. Enjoyed OG tremendously, got some fabulous buys and made a note to go back there should time permit in the days to come.

From OG we decided to head back to the hotel but not before exploring the famous (or is it infamous?) Bugis Street.

Bugis Street is apparently known for it’s transvestites and cross dressing culture and has street shopping (supposedly the largest in Singapore) comparable to our Fashion Street in Mumbai.

Keep in mind the weather in Singapore at this particular time of the year (March) is very very hot & shopping on the street as opposed to in an air-con mall is not my cup of tea. Still, judging by the crowds there (another reason that put me off) obviously not everyone feels that way.

Didn’t hang around there too long but decided to walk around a bit before catching a cab back to the hotel. Saw a lot of interesting building that I really liked- these two were painted bright red & green – such a simple way to keep the place looking attractive. Also saw the Singapore trishaws. They’re like our Rickshaws and Bangkok’s tuk-tuks. Very cute indeed!

Had dinner at the hotel. I planned to go on a swim after a bit (yes, did keep the one hour thingie in mind) but somehow it didn’t happen. Both of us were pretty exhausted after day out shopping & with dinners and warm bath, it seemed only natural to retire into bed.

I did watch a spot of TV before going to bed but was so shocked by the program I saw – some kind of reality TV dating program where the girls were actually telling the guy the hoped to win the date with what they’d do in bed – that I turned off the tele. From the little I know of Singapore, it seems a very varied place – with people of all kinds and all different religious and moral values. I don’t know if I managed to ponder such thoughts too long, I think I drifted off to lala land before I knew it.

After leaving the Cruise, we were dropped to the hotel where we would spend the next two days. Along with us were some other Indian friends who also were on the cruise with us. We all decided to go shopping (though it was late in the night already) at Mustafa’s as it’s open 24 hrs.

Mustafa really is bustling in the night & is as crowded as ever – it’s easy to forget what time of day (or night!) it is when you’re there. This time we didn’t really buy anything except snackie things that we would use over the next few days.

We hadn’t had dinner yet & unfortunately one of the Indian gentlemen who was with our group insisted on only eating Indian ‘Pure Veg’. As a result we went to ‘Chola’s’ a South Indian food place opposite Mustafa’s for dinner.

I was kinda peeved – made up my mind to just be with my mum from this time forth & do our own thing – imagine having to come all the way to Singapore and then be forced to eat Indian food!!

Still when it was all served I did enjoy it all – I had an ‘Egg Onion Parato’… I discovered in Singapore the Paratha is called either a Parato or a Prata (yeah, like Prada, lol). I enjoyed the food tremendously. Guess I was missing home more than I realized. So all in all it turned out very good!

Got up nice & late and went for a long glorious swim (yup, in my new bikini).

After the swim got ready to go to the Singapore Zoo at Mandai.

To quote from the website (link above):

The Singapore Zoo is a model of the `open zoo’ concept.
The animals are kept in spacious, landscaped enclosures, separated from the visitors by dry or wet moats. The moats are concealed with vegetation or dropped below the line of vision.
In the case of dangerous animals such as leopards and jaguars which can climb very well, moat barriers are not used.
Instead, these animals are housed in beautifully landscaped glass-fronted enclosures.
Oppressive cages which typify old zoos, are absent.
The end result is a feeling of openness.

Here’s a Map of the Zoo, which was HUGE!

As I quoted above, the birds & animals are all around you & it’s really like taking a walk into the jungle rather than a zoo except that everything was really well organised and marked out. We started our journey into the wild through some very well done up wooden trails. In fact, the entire zoo has little trails all over, bridges & other pretty things. Even the signs pointing out to different parts of the zoo have animal faces on them (see second last pic below). Found out they even have weddings (!!!!) at the zoo (see last pic) which we personally witnessed.

Here we are just at the start of the zoo & along with some beautiful birds. The second last pic below is of a peacock, just walking about in front of us all. There were a few peahens around too & it must have been mating season, because he did open his feathers & dazzle us all. The last pic are of some beautiful pink flamingoes!

We saw lots of different types of monkeys. Most of them were just around, so close that they could touch you if they wanted… The guy in the second pic reminded us of our little Tiffy back home

Here’s the Spectacular White Tiger. There are only few left in the world, out of which, three gorgeous specimens are in this zoo.

We also saw a show called ‘Elephants of Asia’ in an open air amphitheatre. It was all about the Elephants of Myanmar & how they help their ‘mahouts’ in logging.

We tried to see if any of our footprints matched Konali the elephants, but somehow they didn’t:

Had lunch at KFC’s which was ‘finger lickin’ good’ Bird Flu somehow wasn’t a worry in Singapore (like it is in India) so people are pretty cool about eating chicken all over.

After lunch resumed our journey & saw incredible animals like the triple horned rhinos, cheetas, zebras & meer kats (who were very much on sentry duty!) and the very amazing Polar Bears, to name but a few

We even saw the king of the jungle who did his thing just as we were approaching. It was all very natural & not part of any show, which made it all the more exciting to see. He stood on the edge of a high rock & growled really loudly, head thrown back and all, several times & then sat down royally back on his rocky throne:

When we came to the side later on, we realised what all the fuss was about…. several lionesses (behind glass) were on the other side. If you look at the far end of the pic below, you’ll see the king. In the foreground are all the lionesses.

Yes boy, you impressed the ladies alright.

We also saw some tons of snakes, including the great Anaconda:

Here are some other random shots of us all at the zoo:

UNdoubtedly though, had the most fun milking the cows

All in all, a very tiring day - walked, walked & walked some more. But it was very well worth it. Saw tons more animals, reptiles & birds than I could possibly put up here. Digital cameras allow you to get trigger happy & we must have taken 100s of pics only at the zoo! Came home tired, ate dinner & called it a night.

Got up really late (as I pretty much ended up doing on all days, never mind, this was a holiday!).

Decided to have an early lunch (rather than a late breakfast). Had a Korean meal at the Tiong Bharu Plaza Food Court.

The food was lovely & I enjoyed the whole concept of eating at a food court & being able to chose on of so many different types of cuisines available.

Went off to the HarbourFront to go check out the SSVirgo which had just come in.

My first view of the ship literally took my breadth away!!! It was all I could do to not jump up & down yelling OMG. It was to be my first time ever on a ship - & trust me - the SS Virgo is a fab fab cruise ship. It’s the biggest & best of all the StarCruise ships - the Aries which also was docked looked like a toy boat next to it!

We went aboard the ship admist high security - each time you board or leave, it’s as good as leaving/entering the country & one has to go through immigration, luggage checks etc just like at an airport.

After we were done with the ship (actually they were done with us, they needed us to leave so that they could sail off again on a one day thingie).

Got back & shopped some more. I bought my swimsuit finally - it was a bikini really (here’s a pic I took in the changing room, lol). It was a lot more expy than the ones at Mustufa but a lot better too. Note to the wise: Sing is really expensive esp. if you convert our lovely Indian rupee!

Was quite zonked by this stage, so headed home for a bit of rest before dinner. Dinner was at Marina South, a “2-in-1 BBQ Buffet” at an amazing place called ‘Chong Pang’. A veteran expert on fish - I can honestly say I was Floored by the amazing fish available in Singapore & we ate like greedy pigs.

All the food we took (fish / meat) were either cooked or semi-cooked & each table had a stove & pot of it’s own to BBQ the fish/meat to whatever degree one liked. That was fun in itself but the real treat was in the eating.

Was completely stuffed after dinner but we still decided to drop the kids home & go experience the Singapore night life a little.

First stop was a really retro Jazz Club in Boat Quay.

After spending some time there (& witnessing the incident, lol) we went to another club. The crowd at the Jazz Club seemed classy but the second club seemed highly sidey. Both places were filled with phirangs - except the second had every phirang feeling up an Asian girl (or the other way around). There were even girls pole dancing! I was quite surprised at the openess of it all till I was informed that the girls were not hookers - just employed by the club to make the phirangs spend more money buying drinks. ooookkk?!

There was a really really amazing live band that came on later though (the reason why my cousins go there apparently ) and they really made the trip worthwhile.

Stayed till shut down time. Of course we couldn’t sleep at all so all came home & had a night cap & long discussions on earlier discussed women until we dozed off.

(Leave your comments only at the end of this adventure!)