Singapore: The Lion City

As our journey back to Thailand would have taken over thirty hours, when we booked our flights we decided to split it up ever so slightly by stopping in Singapore for a couple of nights.


Singapore, one of the richest cities on earth, isn't renowned for its backpacker hostels and budget guesthouses - we were looking at £40 and up a night for shared dorms in some cases. So, we thought it'd be nice to treat ourselves a little and unleash our inner-flashpacker by booking ourselves into a Boutique Hotel: Hotel 1929.

Hotel 1929 was in Chinatown

We arrived at the Hotel at 9.30am, stepping into a reception area full of unusual seats - the barbers chair and bicycle saddle on a pole were particular favourites - and an enormous TY beanie baby bear. Boutique and kitsch. Excellent. We were tired and sweaty after over twenty four hours of travelling and, as we tried to check-in, we discovered, much to our dismay, that this wasn't possible until 3pm. This meant that we'd have to wander Singapore's clean, shiny streets donning our sweat rings and eye bags for the next few hours. We gathered together some maps and hit the road, thankfully able to leave our backpacks with the hotel.

A couple of cool chairs in Hotel 1929

Characteristically, our first thought was for food, something that is never far away in Singapore. On numerous street corners are Hawker Centres, enormous food courts offering food from every corner of the earth - Japanese, Thai, Korean, Chinese, Indian and more - and spanning one, two, three floors. We sat down to our first bowl of delicious chicken laksa at a Hawker Centre in Chinatown and it did not disappoint. 

On the streets of Singapore

We decided that the best way to get around was on one of the Big Red Bus tours. You know the type. The sort you see in numerous major cities. Luckily the bus stopped right outside our hotel, so we hopped on and purchased two tickets at S$33 (£16.50), which lasted us 48 hours - the duration of our stay. We had time for a quick tour before check-in, meaning that we were able to get an idea of the city, where everything was and how it sat relative to everything else, gearing us up for later in the evening.

 By the time we got into the hotel room, we had completely forgotten about the late check-in. After sleeping in what is essentially the backseat of a car for a month, the room was glorious (despite the fact that you could shower and pee at the same time while the other person waved and tapped on the glass wall from the bed).

We had a bit if a laze around for a few hours, indulging in the free wifi and watching imported programs like Australlian Masterchef (which is superior to the UK version by the way) and So You Think You Can Dance? on cable TV, before we headed down to a place called Marina Parade for sunset.

Singapore is full of malls. In fact, every other doorway is an air-conditioned shopping centre filled with expensive, designer and/or brand name shops. Despite being one of many, Marina Parade still stands out. As we were still adapting to the hike in temperature after New Zealand, we spent an hour cooling off as we admired the window displays and made wish lists of items from Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Gucci and every other expensive, couture brand you could think of (and more that you couldn't). This place was so luxurious, it even had a river running through the middle of its ground floor. As we marvelled down at it from a balcony, a gondola floated past carrying a couple. Such indulgence isn't surprising, however, when you consider the fact that it sits almost right next door to a new multi-billion dollar super-structure hotel and casino complex called Marina Bay Sands. Completed last year, it's actually more of a resort, with two thousand five hundred and sixty one hotel rooms, the world's biggest infinity swimming pool (one hundred and fifty metres and overhanging one of the buildings three towers) and a three hundred and forty metre long sky park (as in trees, grass, benches, etc). Utter insanity.

That's a river inside a shopping centre

Both buildings were on a lake with a beautifully kept promenade circling it - a perfect place to sit and watch the sun go down over the glass and metal skyscrapers of the city. And that's exactly what we did, arguably getting a little too snap happy trying to capture the different shades of pink, orange and red in the sky and the lights of the buildings of the Central Business District offices flickering into life on the other side of the lake. Before it got too dark, we walked around the Marina, which was kind of like walking around a super-modern Westminster, with more bright lights and glass and less history.

Sun going down over the CBD

We crossed over the a twirly, helix-looking bridge, adorned in fairy lights, and meandered round to the Merlion statue, the odd half-lion, half-fish tourism symbol of Singapore. The fish said to represent Singapore's history as a fishing village and the lion head embodying the cities original name, Singapura - literally 'Lion City'. As we were looking at this strange monument, an amazing light show from the Marina Bay Sands began and we stopped to watch it for what must have been half an hour. It was very impressive with huge strobe lights, coloured lights and even fire!

A chance performance

Using the tiny map in Lonely Planet, we managed to navigate to Lau Pa Sat, a food court set in an old Victorian rotunda, where we stopped for dinner. Once again, the array of food on offer was staggering. This is in no small part due to the fact that Singapore doesn't have a national identity per se. It is a country made up of other nationalities (predominantly Chinese, but also including Malayan and Indian) and therefore has no real national cuisine and no 'Singaporean' language.  Back to the food, for a metropolitan city, the choices on offer were extremely cheap - a meal would cost you around S$5 (£5) - and were incredibly tasty. This place was far bigger than where we had been for brunch and even had a live band playing cheesy hits from the likes of Whitney Houston and Elton John. Tapping our feet to the music, we ordered soupy noodles with chicken and dumplings (or to give it its official name, Ban Mian) and got stuck in with our chopsticks-spoon combo. Full, we managed to work our way home on foot through Singapore's incredibly safe streets. 

Shiny, shiny buildings on the walk home

After a delicious complimentary breakfast provided by the hotel, we started our second day at Chinatown's Buddha Tooth Relic, which is said top contain one of the teeth of Buddha (and if you cast your minds back to our time in Sri Lanka, we also visited a temple there which contained his tooth. The poor guy must be scattered across Asia). Inside the four-storied, dynasty-style Museum-cum-Temple, the Tooth Relic was filled with vibrant and colourful shrines and lamps as well as the offerings that had been made by devotees earlier that morning - money, bananas, papayas, dragonfruits...We also had the chance to watch part of a daily service, with the congregation taking part in the chanting of The Great Perfection of Wisdom Sutra, all of them reading from books and keeping time with the monk at the front of the room. It monotonous drawl of the crows was a little disconcerting as you passed through.

The Buddha Tooth Relic

The Great Perfection of Wisdom Sutra

'Enlightened', we were back on the Big Red Bus. Whilst this wasn't necessarily the cheapest way of getting around, it was probably the most effective on a short time scale. Plus, it meant we got to hear all sorts of different Singapore-based facts. For instance, in Singapore every for every one year over ten years you own a car, its road tax will rise by an additional 10%. This means that there are very few old, inefficient cars on the road. It also means that Singapore is one of the biggest used car exporters in the world. This is a good idea in theory, but surely it mean that your just exporting pollution to somewhere else in the world?   

Rainbow windows

Our ticket included a boat tour along the cities river, so we decided to get taken to this first, while the day was still relatively cool. It was well worth doing and we were shown Fullerton Building, Formerly a post office and now playing host to tourists as a luxury hotel, Clarke Quay, a fashionable place to see and be seen whilst having dinner or enjoying a bottle of Tiger Beer and what used to be the Police Station and Barracks, but now sits colourfully along the side of the river showing off it's nine hundred and twenty seven painted windows.



We took a stroll down the infamous, brand-name-lined Orchard Road, dipping in and out of the  malls and shops and getting nostalgic over familiar shops like M&S and Topshop. After getting sick of the fact we couldn't buy anything, we walked to The Book Cafe, a nice place filled with books and magazines thy Richard had spotted on foursquare. We enjoyed a hot chocolate and an incredible slice of baked cheesecake.

Whilst in India we watched a crappy magic show named after its host and performer: Cyril. It was cheesey, self-indulgent and truly awful. Anyway, he did a flamboyant magic trick involving pulling money out of thin air outside Singapore's Fountain of Wealth, the largest fountain in the world (or at least it was at one point). We decided to find it and see what all the fuss was about and, when we arrived, discovered a list of rules explaining how the fountain works. They stated that, in order for your wish to come true, you had to walk around the fountain three times in a clockwise direction with your right hand in the water. Once finished, you make a wish. We're still waiting on our wishes - we'll keep you posted.

The fountain was located inside yet another shopping complex, Suntec City, and we decided to get dinner here. Needless to say, it was another great one, with Ashley opting for another Ban Mian, whilst Richard dived into a tasty Tuk Tuk Mee. All of these South East Asian treats were getting us excited for what we had in store in Thailand and Vietnam.

This photo doesn't do the food justice

This was apt because, at 9am the next morning, we left our hotel and caught Singapore's underground metro system to the airport, we boarded our Thai Airways flight to Bangkok.