Thursday, March 01, 2007

Singapore? You ain't pore...

First thing I gotta say about Singapore is that the place is really nice, organized, and definitely not pore.

I can remember learning somewhere during my studies that Singapore is one of the cleanest cities in the world and I would have to agree with this truth. Especially considering that this city is located in Southeast Asia. Dare I say it, but the place almost reminded me of Calgary, only not so spread out and nicer.
You can't buy chewing gum here. It's actually illegal. But even crazier is the fact that people drive sensibly and stay in their own lanes. People on scooters and motorcycles don't ride on the sidewalk and they actually follow the same rules as the cars and don't weave in and out of traffic. It's a really civilized place...

Almost too civilized.

We only spent one night and one day in Singapore but that was long enough to see just about all of the city. We visited Chinatown, Little India, walked the waterfront, and went to a bar during the night. We walked just about everywhere we went and it wasn't far.

We spent our one night at a place called Chimes. It was kinda like a walled-in courtyard with a bunch bars in the middle. The places were nice but it was damn expensive. Nearly ten Canadian dollars a beer which is way too much. We knew it was an expensive city and that's why we planned to only stay one night, but I'm sure there were some cheaper options we would have found if we had more time there.

Besides the expensive booze, the worst thing about Singapore was that we had to share a room with other people. One of the people staying in our room woke up and turned the lights on and woke us up.

He was from B.C. and when we told him we were Newfs he made some bad joke about inbreeding. I'm all down for making and receiving fun but you gotta give the relationship a little time to foster before you start hauling out the guns.

With that one comment our attitude towards him soured, but he kept up, hitting on the girls and then talking about his kids back in Canada and how they like Sponge Bob.

On top of this, he was too old to be staying in a cheap hostel, but at the same time kept saying that the made good money in Southeast Asia attempting to get us to ask him what he did. No one asked.

When we checked out I forgot my sheets so I had to run up and grab them. Dude was still in the room and said something like "Well, good luck with your travels and I hope you don't end up in a room in Malaysia with a bunch of weirdos. That can make your trip really bad."

It's a good thing we spent such a short time in Singapore because he definitely coulda been a trip ruiner.

Here are some fridge magnets I bought. I think they kinda sum up the place better than I can.
For those of you who need some translating, urinating means takin' a piss, and lifts are elevators.

Unlike the rest of the world, you can't piss in an elevator here. What a stupid rule...
But I think this is allowed in Singapore. It's a weird world...

1 comment:

Jennifer Turek said...

Too funny ... I'm looking forward to checking it out after looking through your photos ... only three more sleeps to go ...