Mmmm, strawberry.
After a long visit to Vietnam, we sailed for two days then
landed in Singapore for about 36 hours. A pretty short visit to this pivotal
trade center that reminds me somewhat of New York City: big, urban, lots of
skyscrapers, lots of taxis and public transportation. A lot of things, struck
me as different, too.
Singapore is known for strict laws, and there are
regulations and signs posted reminding us visitors what not to do–jaywalk,
spit, chew gum–or else pay hefty fines. As part of the briefings we receive on
the MV Explorer prior to docking, we also learned that there are laws against
offending public and personal modesty, so you have to be careful about public
displays of affection, and you sure better not litter or vandalize. There
aren’t a lot of uniformed police around but there are cameras and most likely
plain-clothes officers around. It’s my impression that Singapore, as a
relatively new Asian city, originated from wealth and has always been clean and
orderly as opposed to other places such as China and Vietnam that are dirty and
still rising up to economic prosperity.
Yes, the culture has a sense of powerful authoritarianism,
but there are plenty of tourist destinations including fancy hotels, casinos,
bars, restaurants, and the students hit up the casinos. I was a little worried
that some of the students would test their independence and get in trouble, but
as far as I know, everyone made it back to the ship and avoided caning or
arrest.
It’s a beautiful place. The streets are clean, buildings are
tall, and the landscape is jungle plants, green grass, and flowers. Traffic
runs on the left as in England, and the country seems to not have thrown off
the anglo names, so there are lots of references to Col. Raffles and other
English colonizers even after independence in 1965. What strikes me most about
Singapore is the multicultural influences of India, China, Malaysia, and
England. Signs are posted in multiple languages with English predominating, and
there’s also a creole mixup of the languages that lots of natives speak which
they refer to as Singlish. There are also thrown into the mix Islam, Buddhism,
Taoism, Christianity, and perhaps a few other religions. So, everywhere I went,
I could see the various cultural influences on the foods, buildings, and
fashion.
With so little time, we decided to make a few concrete plans
for Semester at Sea trips along with independent time to see what we could see.
On day one, Ellen, Jasper, and her dad visited a couple museums and scoped out
the MRT subway system. I had gotten an invite to join three students, Nate,
Ethan, and Ed, for a mountain bike ride on a small island to the northeast of
Singapore known as Pulau Ubin. The island was reachable by bumboat, which I
guess means once there are 12 bums seated the boat travels across the half mile
to the island. Once there, we found about a half dozen bike shops with a few
recognizable brands (Raleigh, Wheeler, Trek) and a few new ones (Polygon?
Unicorn???), and we were hoping to get some decent rides for myself and the
three students who are just getting into riding. Well, most of the bikes had
the same low-end componentry, and most of the frames were for 5-foot tall
tourists rather than us 6-foot-plus riders, so our search for high-end bikes
was not to be. My inclination was to bypass the clunky full suspension and
low-end disc brake models and find something that fit us taller guys. The hardtail
Wheelers were a decent enough fit, so we settled on them and even sprung for
helmets, which practically no one else did. Signs pointed the way along a
narrow asphalt roadway to Kerlin Mountain Bike Park, which was built under
International Mountain Bike Association (IMBA) guidelines, so we were stoked at
the aspect of riding real trails. The trails were graveled in places, sandy in
others, and muddy most everywhere even when built according to IMBA standards.
With the near-daily downpours, the trails don’t really dry out, so they were
spongy and slow going, so we got a decent workout in the humid, hot conditions.
Trails reminded me somewhat of the urban Richmond VA trails such as Buttermilk
without the fast flow you get when the ground is hard and dry. These trails
weaved up and down some short hills, and there were some roots and a bit of
rock thrown in for a little more technical gnar than I expected.
All four of us reached the island around noon, remarking
that even though we had decent breakfasts on the ship, we were getting hungry.
Oh, well, it was noon, the bikes were procured, and we found the trails in the
hot part of the day. We rode for about three hours and were completely soaked
in sweat along with the random mud splashes on our shirts and shorts. I had
brought along my Camelbak with plenty of fluids and a number of gel packets, so
I doled them out whenever we were getting close to the inevitable bonk when you
run out of fuel. The riding was good, we left with no injuries and only minimal
damage to the clunkers (a broken flat pedal scored by Ethan and a semi-tacoed
rear wheel after Ed’s power slide) as we dropped off the dirty bikes and
high-tailed it to the bumboat for the return ride.
Once back, we were famished and eyed a restaurant with
chilli crabs. However, looking at Nate, Ed, Ethan, and myself, we were all
dirty, smelly, and soaked in sweat, so a sit-down meal might not have worked.
There was a hawker centre near the ferry, and these are essentially outdoor
food courts with a great variety of cuisines including Korean, Japanese,
Malaysian, Chinese, and other fusions. Plus, the food is really inexpensive,
about as much as a Big Mac and soda at home but far better. None of us really
agreed on exactly what cuisine to get, but it worked out great that we could
each grab stuff and sit at the communal tables. I got a pineapple juice (1 SND,
one Singaporean dollar or about 80 cents US), a fried whole banana ($1.20 SND),
and a mixed chicken and cuttlefish curry ($4.50 SND for a large). I asked for
it spicy, and it delivered with a slow-build heat that left my mouth burning
for an hour afterwards. Excellent.
At this point in the first day, it was nearing 1700 (5pm),
and I wanted to make it back to the ship around 1700ish to get a shower and
join up with my family for the planned SAS trip. Ed, Nate, Ethan, and I finally
figured out how to flag down a cab after a few attempts (it doesn’t work
midblock, so we found a corner where the driver stopped) and hopped in a very
nice black cab. The driver agreed to take us back to the ship, and the cost was
quite reasonable, about $7.50 SND each for the half-hour ride. It was a long, slow,
smelly ride, and I felt sorry that the driver had to shuttle us since we were
all such a mess.
I took a super-quick shower, dressed in clean clothes, then
went to the gangway to meet the group for our trip. Huh, it so happened that
Ellen, Jasper, and my father-in-law were there, so we were on our way to the
Singapore Night Safari without my missing out after a long day of riding and
traversing the island. Basically, the Night Safari is what the name says it is:
a zoo that’s open beginning at dark, and you walk among nighttime exhibits and
take a tram around to see animals in their nocturnal active state. It was
great, but I don’t have pictures since I didn’t fiddle with the programmable
settings for night shots minus flash. Sandy got a few good shots of a leopard,
but most of the animals didn’t happen to pose near the low-output lighting.
Even at night with minimal light, you were still able to see lots, and there
were the active deer, foxes, lions, hippos, tigers, elephants, lynxes,
panthers, giraffes, tapir, and furry critters. There were also bat houses that
had the largest bats on earth, fruit-eating bats that are about the size of an
upside-down housecat. There were also local critters who migrated into the zoo:
rats, mice, and bats were scurrying around and led to high-pitched screams.
Good times.
Ellen and I signed out of the Night Safari return trip and
skipped the bus ride back for a few hours to ourselves. Time for the two of us
is scarce, so with me having ditched everyone during the day and Ellen’s dad
offering to take Jasper back and put him to bed, we wanted to see some things
on our own and opted to catch a cab to the MRT subway. It was nearing midnight
and many things were closed down, including about ¾ of the stalls in the hawker
center closer to the Chinatown area. However, the center had a few stalls open
and some crucial items: shaved ice with fruit, and beer. Ellen described a
shaved-ice concoction that Jasper had earlier that day topped with
strawberries, so that sounded good to me. We got one that was basically a tall
scoop of ice topped with fruit cocktail and a yellow, fruity, semi-bitter
sauce. Good, once we were a few bites in. I’d had my fill of fizzy pale lager
in Vietnam, so it was good to see German Erdingers and a handful of other
beers. I got a Guinness Foreign Extra stout–not a great beer in the
over-the-top high ABV vein I had been in prior to the trip, but it was nice to
have a good enough black beer.
On day two, we taxied over to the Singapore Garden by the
Sea, a new botanical garden with supertrees–think of a cyborg tree with metal
branches and solar panels, and that’s about right. The outdoor exhibits at the
Garden were free, and we took a ride (a few $SND) to the suspended platform at
about 22 meters, or the height at the top of a typical rainforest on the main
island. Sandy was looking to spend some more time with Jasper, so they went to
a science museum while Ellen and I got to spend some more time alone together.
We went to an older botanical garden and got in some long walks among the
orchids.
One more taxi ride, and then we were back onboard and now
we’re off toward Burma. The seas are very calm right now in the Malacca Strait
on our way northward. The air is balmy and a bit humid, with air and water
temps both the same around 85 degrees. It’s a big difference than what we
usually experience at home this time of year, so we’ll be acclimating to hot on
the remainder of our trip.
Best to everyone,
Scott
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