Singapore is a city-state with a
diverse mixture of ethnicities, cultures and religions, all bunched up
onto one big island. As a former British colony, you can bet that 99% of
the people you'll run into speak English at least passingly well. As its
own sovereign entity, and as a relatively small population, Singapore has
the distinction of also being able to pass laws that would be nearly
impossible to enforce in the US, simply to make life easier. Someone stuck
gum in the door to the train and prevented the train from moving for hours
due to the jammed-door interlock? Simple -- outlaw chewing gum with a $500
fine. Want clean streets? Littering is also a $500 fine, and vandalism is
punishable by caning and imprisonment. Cars cost an average of $130,000
(Singapore dollars -- that's about $80,000 US) and are expensive to
replace if damaged in an accident? Speeding is a $5000 fine.
There is a Chinatown, a Little India, and an Arab Street, with very
distinct demarcations where each neighborhood begins. It's not that
there's a Checkpoint Charlie between each of them, but rather you suddenly
notice that the faces have all changed, the street names are spelled and
pronounced differently, and the smells of the food coming out of the shops
are very distinctly unique to each area. Here's a view of Little India.
And yes, the Merlion. Malay legend has it that a Sumatran prince
encountered a lion (considered to be an omen of good luck) on Temasek,
prompting him to found Singapura, or "Lion City." He may have actually run
across a tiger -- there have never been lions naturally living on
Singapore, but oh well. The Merlion statue, a dual symbol of the lion's
continuing good luck and the maritime history of the island, stands in the
center of Sentosa Island. It has been upgraded in recent years, to feature
a laser light show at dark around and even from the statue of the Merlion
itself.
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Above, you see the cable-car ride to Sentosa Island, a sort of
suburb of Singapore where you'll find resorts, the best beaches, and
several theme parks (including an aquarium where you can swim with sharks
for $100 plus a pretty thick waiver, a roller-coaster, a water park and a
shopping mall, as well as the famous Merlion tower.)
We happened to hit the liberty ports in the weeks preceding the
Chinese Lunar New Year, and so all the markets had candies and gift boxes
of dried foods for giving as gifts, as well as other traditional items
such as the red paper envelopes for giving lucky money. Chinatown was too
crowded to take pictures; if you're claustrophobic, then Chinatown during
the Chinese New Year is NOT the place for you to be, because you'll be
CRUSHED by literally tens of thousands of people crowded into about ten
square blocks of stores and markets. If you're willing to fight the crowds
like a spawning salmon, however, you can find some good deals on a lot of
hard-to-find items.
One of the many temples scattered throughout the city, this one
dedicated to the Hindu religion. The tower is decorated with scenes from
Hindi mythology, including many of their gods and deities. Around the
city, there are also a large number of Buddhist temples and churches of
various Christian denominations, as well as the enormous Sultan Mosque
situated at one end of Arab St.
More of Singapore on the next page!
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