Singapore

From the Sumatran jungle to the city streets of Singapore! We enjoyed a four-day stop in the 'city of lions', a misnomer as the only four-legged creatures we saw were a family of otters in the marina. Otterpore doesn’t quite work though, does it?

Singapore is a strategic trading post, finance hub, and former British colony as expensive as Sydney. Hence the brief stay. We were entertained by nation-building narrative projects at the National Museum, as well as the South East Asian solidarity of the Asian Civilisations Museum and the National Gallery. Chelsea particularly enjoyed the work of Lee Cheng Yong, Georgette Chen, and Chen Wen Hsi.

We assailed our ears in Little India, Chelsea caught up with Anja in Chinatown, and we enjoyed the chaos and culinary delights of a hawker hall. We also frequented a local café on Haji Lane that served $3.50 nasi lemak, allowing us to ‘splurge’ at dinner. We’re down to two meals a day, a financial decision with aesthetic consequences. However, one thing we have added to our diet is sweet tea in all its varieties—we have gotten firmly on the bubble tea train and seriously regret not buying stocks in Mixue.

The Singapore Botanical Gardens were excellent, before returning to town for happy hour at CHIJMES (the wedding venue in Crazy Rich Asians). We decided against a Singapore Sling at Raffles ($41pp!) because the queue was too long and it’s just silly expensive. We opted for the $10 version at a Sichuan restaurant instead, and decided we’d made the right call.

On our last night we visited the Gardens by the Bay for the light and sound display in the Supertree Grove, the ship-on-stilts of the Marina Bay Sands looming in the background. The show is pretty overwhelming with flashing LEDs and strobes, which is on brand for the region of course.

It's very hard to go wrong in Singapore. Everyone is very well-behaved, everything is well-ordered. The ongoing threat of the death penalty might contribute to that a bit. We have thoroughly enjoyed being able to rinse our toothbrushes in clean tap water and walk on pavements absent of gaping holes. But the cleanliness and clarity also means we haven't had any embarrassing adventures or mishaps since we arrived. Apologies to our loyal readers hoping for gossip.

All good things must come to an end though. For the sake of our wallets, we're on our way to Malaysia. Updates from country #5 incoming!Lue lisää