Email Entry No. 1 of Singapore. Date: Tues Jan 29th 2008 at 1:40pm
Hello everyone, I miss all of you! I apologize for this long email but there are so many things to talk about :-)
I wish you could also be here to see Singapore with me, it is quite a
fantastic place!!! It would be even more interesting to see all this
with you!
First of all, on the flight here, I talked to an Australian who was
doing business in Hong kong, a German wife- Britta and the Swiss
husband-Charles who was traveling the world (many countries in Asia and
heading to Australia). The couple has seen more cities in Vietnam than
I could talk about: Hanoi, Hoi An, Hue, Da Lat, Ho Chi Minh city, etc.
They were very kind to give me their phones and emails if I come to
Switzerland they would be happy to see me. The Australian gentleman
also gave me his business card and tell me to also contact him if I
come to Hong Kong. He makes me feel like all Australians are incredibly
friendly people and they can also talk a lot, which I smiled and nodded
most of the time.
Singapore on the whole is warm, pretty clean, extremely safe, efficient
and very comfortable.The best thing here is the mix of people which
made it terrific to sit on a sidewalk cafe and watch people walking by.
I saw many people from all
over the world: Singaporeans, Chinese, Malay, Indians, Germans,
Frenchs, Italians, Americans, Japanese. etc and of course, Vietnamese
like me. It's common to hear English ( with different accents) and
dozens of other languages anywhere in Singapore. I
think this diversity here is one of the real treasures Singapore has.
So far I have walked around Singapore quite a bit and see a couple of very interesting things: ( in no particular order)
1. Orchard Road: as busy as Times Square on bad days, sooo crowded.
Mark would faint...but all the shopping is fantastic. There are so much
choices in styles and stores as much as other great shopping city: New
York and Vegas. These massive multi-storey malls can be interconnected
and like in Vegas, being in them for a while and you have no clue
whether it's day or night, hot or cold outside. It made me think: come
on, Singapore isn't small, it's massive judging by the sizes of their
malls.
2. Singapore MRT, which is the underground transit, it is modern,
clean, fast and air conditioned. It is very simple to use with similar
organization as the D.C. metro. But the difference is every MRT station
(of which I have seen anyway) is a huge underground shopping centers. I
mean it, you can't imagine it unless you see it with your own eyes.
There are sometimes 3 levels underground and it makes you wonder how
deep you are. Smart money making plan for their subway station. There
are many choices of affordable food there too. In short, you cannot
escape shopping if you are in Singapore. If I see another shopping
mall, think I'm gonna cry. You have to look everywhere you go, it's
terrible for your budget. Hae, you'll suffer most here and also at
Orchard :-) I'm doing pretty well ( I think) because I'm sick of
shopping now.
3. Food: if you come to Singapore, drink their coffee and tea, which is
very good (the local version is different than the U.S.) Thanks to a
multicultural society here, the selection is great. Most the food
stalls are clean (inspection is strict and competition is fierce as the
Lonely Planet guide told me). My fav places to eat are the "food
courts" called the Food Republic (literally). The choices are
staggering. Each Food Republic is decorated in a different style. So
far, I ate in the library one ( in Suntec Bldg) and one that looks like
ancient China with red lanterns, and wooden everything, quite charming.
For all this, it only cost around $6 ( maybe 4.50 US dollars) for some
Chinese noodle soup with a coffee. It's the place to dine in style on a
budget!
They also have wonderful bakeries which makes me drooooool. I can eat
there all the time, most only cost S$1.50 :-)))) Of course, they have
more expensive places to eat too, like by the fancy Singapore River (
fantastic View). Locals told me chilli crab is a must try.
4. Museum and Theatre: I went to the Singapore National Museum and the
Asian Civilization Museum. At the National Museum, I only had time to
check out their borrowing collection of Greek sculptures from the
Lourve. Apparently, it's one of the largest collection the Lourve let
anyone borrowed, 180 pieces of them all. The thing that impressed me at
these museum is how modern their lighting system is. Everything is so
well lighted and carefully arranged it really can create good moods.
The Asian Civilization Museum was awesome!!!! I'd say it could be on
the par with the New York Metropolitan Museum of Arts. I went with my
sister's class. It was their field trip. We had a British guide who
specializes in Egyptian anthropology and loves history. He was so coool
and knowledgable.And I must say that I'm a lucky girl. Arupa, listen to
this carefully! When I was there, there was a special exhibition called
On The Nalanda Trail, which was a Buddhist school thousands years ago.
Security in this exhibition is tight like in New York with guards,
metal detectors and strictly no bags which is common for New York but
strange for safe Singapore. The reason is they had the Buddha relics
displayed on loan from India. Monks come here to pay respect and such.
India only lets this treasure out of their country TWICE and I was here
just in time to see it. I learned and saw more of Buddhism and Islam in
an hour than I know my entire life. In short, it was a very moving
experience!!! Dave and Mona, I think you would also find this museum a
treasure considering how we enjoyed museums on our trips.
There are still many things I'd like to see here yet. Tonight, I have
tickets for the La Traviata opera at the Esplanade. It was built to be
iconic on par with Sydney Opera House in Sydney. I can't wait. It's
gonna be 3 hours long though!!
That's it for now. I'm sorry again for the length of this email. It's good practice for my English writing too :-)
Bye now,
Lan
