Day (??) Singapore (February 25, 2011)

I've lost track of what day of my trip I'm on.  I usually remember to look at my blog's last entry to remind me, but today I forgot.

So I didn't actually walk the entire width of Singapore, but my legs feel like they did.  This is such a walkable city, though, and very pretty, that it was a pleasure to walk everywhere, even though the sweat was pouring down my body.

Ever been to Walt Disney World?  Specifically, Epcot?  Know how Epcot is one half this "world of the future" and the other half has all those mini and idealized "countries" that are very clean and pretty and sterile and overpriced?  Now imagine Epcot is a real place and you're got Singapore.  In all seriousness, it is really nice here, even in a "seedy" part of town like mine; I have no qualms at all wandering outside at nighttime.  But I wonder how the city manages to stay so nice.  It must be very rich, with a large clean-up crew, and enforce all of its laws about littering, etc. quite vigorously.  (Speaking of those littering laws, did you know the fine for chewing gum in Singapore is $1000, while the fine for urinating in an elevator is only $500?  Personally, I'd reverse those numbers.)

Some photos of town.  Most buildings are very new and modern, but I included some older ones too, because there is a fair amount of variety:

The former Supreme Court.

Sir Stamford Raffles, who founded the city of Singapore in 1819.

The most fun thing I did today was ride the Singapore Flyer, the giant ferris wheel like the London Eye.  I rode the Eye a few years ago and really liked it, so I knew I'd like this too.  The day was slightly overcast, so my photos aren't quite as crisp as I'd like, but it was a great overview of the city.  Plus I was able to scope out places to walk that I might not have discovered if I only had a ground-level view.  The Flyer provides little audio guides if you want them, talking about how the ferris wheel was brought in compliance with feng shui principles, such as by rotating towards the financial district, so it would steer good fortune and well, fortune towards to the city.  I don't really buy into that stuff, but I liked that the audio guide was more than just a description of what I was looking at, or how the wheel was built, but actually got into some local philosophy.

The view at the top.

Singapore is about 70% ethnic chinese, and has a colorful Chinatown.  And it's a real Chinatown, not like that one block in DC that says it's Chinatown, but really isn't.  The place had a number of narrow streets, packed with vendors selling pretty nice things (to my surprise) and some cheap souvenirs (of course).  It also had several restaurants that I'm glad I passed up because they were too expensive.  Because once I was just about one block away from all the vendors and restaurants, I found this open-air food court that served nothing but chinese food, and was populated entirely by chinese patrons, and was about 1/6 the price of all the places I'd passed up.  Once again, yay for cheap food!  I might actually be able to remain within my trip's budget and still eat well if I keep finding great and cheap food like this.  Oh, and I discovered I like pig liver.  I tried it after a little coaxing, then went back for seconds.  Here's Chinatown:

New Year's decorations.  It's the Year of the Rabbit.