Singapore Overview

Over Chinese New Year, I escaped Shanghai for Singapore. I selected Singapore because I wanted to spend the time in a place I like, and where I could relax, easily get around, eat well, be warm, and yet have Chinese New Year activities.

I was in Singapore from Saturday night, February 13, 2010, through early Tuesday morning, February 16, and then again from Friday night, February 19, through Wednesday, February 24. (I left Singapore for Cambodia in the middle of week. I'll write about that trip in a series of other posts.)

As this was my third (and fourth, depending on how you count) trip to Singapore, I don't have many new impressions of Singapore to add to my first two overview posts.

On this trip I had a new reaction to Singapore's climate. It was hot and dry when we landed and walked to our hotel. This was uncomfortable weather, making me wonder how I could've forgiven Singapore for its climate on my past visits. Happily, the next day was less hot (though of course still hot) and it was much easier to survive. We also decided on that day that the area we were staying in tends to be slightly warmer than elsewhere in Singapore. From those two observations, I forgave my initial reaction. The following day, however, it was blazingly hot and sunny in our neighborhood. Maybe Singapore is icky after all, or maybe we just walked around too much. It's not a climate in which one should go on long, exploratory hikes.

Coming from Shanghai, I found it hard to get used to crossing the street in Singapore--cars actually stop when you stand near a cross-walk and look like you want to cross!

Also, although I've mentioned this before, I'll mention it again: I'm continually impressed how Singapore's government publishes good guides: walking tours of numerous districts, guides to local food specialists, event guides, overviews of tourist attractions, and even guides with descriptions of fun activities in the airport. Every time I travel to Singapore I discover new ones. They're all designed, organized, and presented well, and contain useful and interesting information.

Shorter observations/comments:

• I only now noticed that cameras are everywhere in the subway system.
• I appreciate that food comes in appropriate portion sizes, not in enormous American sizes.
• I still like the variety and availability of drinks, often freshly blended juices. On this trip, I had watermelon juice, barley tea, ginger tea, oolong tea, and water chestnut juice.
• Books are expensive.

Sometime around this trip, I learned some interesting little-known facts about Singapore:

• Singapore had a two-child policy for a while, though it now has many government incentives to encourage people (especially educated citizens) to have three or more. The article, Fertility and Population Policy: The Singapore Experience by Yap Mui Teng, published in 2003 in the Journal of Population and Social Security: Population Study, has a good overview of the policies and their effects. For more analytic articles about Singapore's population, aging, and government policies, see Yap Mui Teng's home page at Institute of Policy Studies in the National Institute of Singapore.
• Singapore censors and sometimes surveils. I always knew Singapore's government strictly enforces some stringent policies, and I knew at a subconscious level that this includes censoring media (in all its forms). However, because I'm bothered that I sometimes forget this fact at a conscious level, I'm posting this bullet to the blog. By the way, here's the best overview of censorship in Singapore.
• It's illegal to not flush a toilet.

For my own reference, some other activities I'd still like to try in Singapore (i.e., things I haven't yet done on these multiple trips):

• Explore more neighborhoods, especially via self-guided walking tours, and more parks and nature.
• Take a bumboat ride on the Singapore River?
• Visit Sentosa's Butterfly Park?
• Wander through Haw Par Villa (a.k.a. Tiger Balm Gardens), an old theme park filled with statues and dioramas from Chinese myths/stories.
• Play LilliPutt miniature golf, a miniature golf course with tiny models of Singapore's sights?
• Fish at Yishun Bottle Tree Park or the Jurong Hill Prawn Fishing & Beer Garden?

and some other dishes I've still missed:

• Yusheng ("prosperity") salad. A salad of raw fish, vegetables, and sauces commonly eaten among Chinese people in southeast Asia during Chinese New Year.
• roti john.
• yong tau foo.

(I can't believe I've nearly tackled my entire to-eat-in-Singapore list -- I thought it was almost impossibly long!)