July 23 - Museums and the Heart of Singapore

July 23 Day 159

            

A very interesting statue downtown.

The merlion fountain.

Singapore slings at their birthplace.

    We got up and headed out to find breakfast.  Our hostel gave us 2 breakfast passes for each day for two places so we went to the one that was further away (a 5 minute walk) but had more interesting choices.  We had the Singapore breakfast, which was similar to an Indonesian one, with rice and packets full of oily sauce, nuts and dried fish.  Along with one of their coffees, it was pretty good.

                The breakfast place was on the hawker food street, which our guidebook said to avoid, but was nicely set up with an elevated roof for rain protection and lots of seats on the pedestrian street.

                We went back to our room, freshened up and then went down to try out the Singapore subway system.  We weren’t going to take enough trips to make the daily pass worthwhile so we got single fare cards, which could be recharged and used up to 6 times.  About every 3 times you used it you got a 10 cent discount but you were still bound to the machines.

                We got to the stop close to the national museum and were trying to orient ourselves outside when someone stopped and helped us out.  We found this to be a pattern in Singapore, if you were checking a map or closely examining street signs someone would stop and actually give you real advice to send you on your way.  We were used to being in countries where if you asked for help people were friendly and told you something but would consider it rude to say they didn’t know a place, so the advice was often more random than helpful.

                We arrived at the museum just before the afternoon tour and so waited around a little while until it started.  The woman who gave us the tour was amazing, covering hundreds of years of the area’s history in a little over an hour.  From Raffles advocating for the city to become a major port to the Japanese invasion to the unsuccessful joining with Malaysia, we got it all in brief.  The displays were clearly set up with many fun multimedia areas and detailed text for people more interested in specific topics.

                Singapore walks many lines, politically.  Only one party has been in power since independence and the first president was a labour lawyer who stayed in power for decades.  You’d think that this would make the country what we consider leftist but the government brought business to the area by allowing them to operate tax free.  They have the death penalty and famously strict laws (jaywalking and gum chewing among them) but have crated a huge amount of social housing for residents.  This housing was also intentionally racially mixed to help combat racism.  It’s an interesting place.

                After the tour we went back to the mall by the subway to get lunch at a food hall.  The place we picked had surprisingly delicious lunches with all you can imbibe drinks and ice cream, so we pigged out.

                Back at the museum we revisited the history galleries that we had toured and found that our guide truly was excellent, most of the interesting stuff was on the tour.   On the top floor was a history of unions in Singapore which was presented as huge amounts of texts covering every year since independence, a bit much for anyone not immersed in Singapore unions history.

                Much nicer was a spiral walkway that led down to the main floor which had a seamless digital display of plants and awkward digital animals moving through various ecosystems as you waked the corkscrew path to the bottom.  Once there, you could stare up at the ceiling and walls in the core and see digital flowers falling to the ground around an don you.  People were lying on the floor taking it all in and at least one person seemed to be asleep.

                Back on the top floor were a series of rhythmically swinging chandeliers and a cluster of rooms covering each decade of Singapore’s independence.  Outside of these rooms were several engaged couples using the building to get their pictures taken and dodging school groups and tourists.  The rooms were all set up well with the highlights being an amazing three-level zoetrope of athletes lighting the olympic torch and a bunch of cars modified into couches in a simulated drive-in theatre showing old tourist promos for the city.

                On the way out was a display on packaging which wasn’t as interesting as I was hoping.  This is where I met up with Meg, who had gotten in trouble for napping in a rest area and was dodging the museum staff who caught her.

                We had researched Jakarta city tours before leaving our room and found most of them to be ridiculous ($90 per person was about average) except for one that operated on tips.  We showed up early because of eh subway’s efficiency and hung out in a nearly deserted mall to kill time.  While looking at a map on a food hall table a woman came over and gave us a 15 minute overview of everything we should check out in the city, another example of the local attitude.

                We met up with our group and guide and started a simple walking tour.  The group really was from everywhere and several people had been on a previous tour with the organization, which was a good sign.  Our guide was approachable, organized and spoke clearly, all of which was good.  He used his tablet to show historical pictures of what the city used to look like and pointed out historic buildings and modern landmarks.  We spent a long time in a fancy hotel sending postcards and a few other places, but he went over the stated time so that meant we didn’t miss anything. 

                We saw statues of famous Singaporeans and the fountain of the merlion spouting water from its mouth.  There was a concert hall that looked like a durian and colonial buildings in such perfect shape we figured they had to have been newly redone for their upcoming 200^th anniversary.

                Our last stop was in the old parliament chambers where he explained the government and answered questions.  Here we found out that to avoid traffic problems most cars are taxed to cost over $100,000 plus a hugely expensive ten year permit.  This policy, combined with the creation of a fast and efficient transport system, is why Singapore’s roads aren’t congested.

                We thanked our guide and Meg took note of the portable PA system he used for her own purposes as a frequent Toronto tour guide.  We noticed that we were close to the Raffles Hotel and so headed up in that direction.  Along the way we met our guide and one of the female participants and wondered if she had participated as a friend or if the guide got lucky.

                Raffles Hotel has to be one of the most expensive in town but was under renovation while we were there.  We could look in, and the grounds did look really nice.  The bar was open but our guide warned us that it was extremely overpriced and named a more affordable bar that had just as good drinks.  We decided that we would splurge anyway.

                The Raffles bar is famous for having the first long bar (the length of a large room) and for the creation of the Singapore Sling.  This drink was made for the ladies, so that they could appear to be enjoying a fruit juice while actually getting sozzled.

                The bar was nice enough but not amazing.  It was renovated first but the upstairs bit was not yet open.  We sat at the bar and ordered our overpriced drinks, mine the classic sling and Meg the virgin one.  In front of us was a huge bag of peanuts in the shell and you were encouraged to toss the shells on the floor.  The staff were very attentive and the manager came over and chatted with us for a bit, which was a nice touch.  On the ceiling were a series of hand fans that moved back and forth.  We were told that they used to operated by staff members but now were hooked to a machine.  The drinks were excellent, with the virgin one having a tasty but different flavour from the classic and we stretched out our time there to crunch lots of peanuts.

                On the way back we noticed a couple where she was in a form-hugging outfit and dressed really strikingly ad the guy looked like he rolled out of bed and threw on dirty and ill-fitting jeans and a t-shirt.  Meg has a whole rant about dolled-up women with scruffy guys.  Contact her if you want to hear it.

                The subway got us back quickly but it was late and we were tired after a busy day.  We settled for a very touristy restaurant close to our hostel that spread across 2 or 3 locations.  They had a special on whiskey and wine was reasonably priced but beer was very expensive everywhere in Singapore.  The food was unremarkable but filling.

                We went to bed hoping the Vietnamese girls would be better behaved tonight.  Things were fine until about 3 am when someone came in with luggage to join the group and we could smell from inside of our room that she brought a durian with her.  Fortunately the room quickly went back to sleep and so did we.