Sights in Singapore

Singapore is where I currently reside, where I’ve been living for over four years.

Located in Southeast Asia, Singapore has a land area of about 710 square kilometres, making her one of the smallest countries in the world and the smallest in the region – hence the moniker “The Little Red Dot”. [source] This country is so small, in fact, that it is as big as an average city and when I have to fill out international forms on the net, it ends up like this:

City: Singapore
Province: Singapore
Country: Singapore

But don’t underestimate its size. Small as it is, it is more progressive than most of her bigger brothers and is currently the world’s fourth leading financial centre, and its port is one of the five busiest ports in the world (according to Wikipedia, anyway).

So anyway, let’s take a tour of this country, starting with the normal everyday sights.

A walk through my neighborhood

One thing I love about Singapore is how clean it is. David from Brits in the USA once asked me if it was true that Singapore was cleanest place in the world. I didn’t know, so I tried to do research and found this 2008 article from CBN that says yes to his question. Well whaddya know.
Singapore is a tropical country, so we have only two kinds of weather: sunny or rainy. Sometimes sunny equals humid too, and I hate those kinds of days, but luckily my office is air-conditioned. So we do the opposite of four-seasoned countries here – we wear coats inside the office and ditch them outside.

Laundry Day (Sing this to the tune in Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog)

Most flats have their own washing machines but most don’t have dryers, like us. And how do we dry our laundry? Like this. By clamping the clothes onto wooden poles and sticking them into slots outside the windows where they can wave like flags in the breeze. It’s great if it’s sunny – I love the smell of fresh laundry that has been dried by sunlight – but if it rains, you need to scramble to bring the poles in unless you want some of the clothes to fall off the poles and to the ground, which was what happened to me one time or two. :-/

Punggol Park picnic

There are parks everywhere in Singapore, and they are all well-maintained. The above picture was taken at a park near our flat. I like to read and relax by the lake or have picnics with my friends. You can rent barbeque pits at most parks in Singapore, and I had my 30th birthday party at East Coast Park last year.

MRT

Since Singapore is such a small land area, they try to limit vehicles and encourage people to use public transportations like trains (MRT) and buses. It’s very convenient to use them, though, because they are very organized and there’s a bus stop or MRT station nearly everywhere, and they’re still building more train lines. When I first arrived here there was only red, green and purple lines. Now there’s yellow and they’re building black or blue, or both.

Ion Orchard

Malls are a thing in Asia. There are malls everywhere in Singapore, at almost every MRT station. The most popular strip of malls, however, can be found in Orchard Road. The one pictured above is my favorite one, architecturally-wise, because it’s not a common square building and it’s kind of a high end mall, so the inside is also very fragrant and beautifully designed. Of course I don’t buy from the pricey stores in there, I stick to Sephora or Daiso or H&M. No Pradas for me, thank you.

And now for the touristy stuff.

Merlion: Singapore’s icon

No tourist should leave Singapore without seeing the Merlion, which is the icon of Singapore. The merlion, as the name suggests, is half lion, half fish. Singapore, you see, was derived from Singapura, which is Malay for Lion City. The above picture is of the original merlion, but there is another giant one in Sentosa island. Below is a close up shot of the merlion at night.

Merlion at night

Singapore Flyer

This is the world’s largest observation wheel, beating out the London Eye. You can ride in here to have a view of Singapore.

Gardens by the Bay aerial view

This is Singapore’s newest attraction, a grove of giant supertrees as well as the flower dome and cloud forest. You can read about it and see more pictures here.

Marina Bay Sands

The hotel that looks like Titanic. LOL. That’s what it looks like to me, anyway! It’s famous for its infinity pool. You can see pictures of that here.

The Singapore skyline

 

The Fountain of Wealth

The largest fountain in the world. You can make a wealth-related wish at the small fountain in the center by walking around it three times while dipping your hands in the water.

Singapore Zoo

I once went to the Singapore zoo with my mom and we both really loved it because it’s so clean and well-maintained, so unlike the Manila Zoo. My favorites were the white tigers, but now they have just brought in pandas and I wanna go back to see those!

And now let’s jump to the ultimate tourist spot, my favorite part of Singapore – Sentosa Island. There’s lots to do there, but I’ll name just a few. If you’re interested to know more, click this.

Far Far Away in Universal Studios

Universal Studios is located in Sentosa island. I’ve been in here twice, I think. The first time with my mom (we just watched all the shows and rode the two least scary rides), the second time for a team outing.

S.E.A. Aquarium

The largest aquarium in the world. Have you noticed that Singapore seems obsessed with “largest in the world” things? Anyway, this aquarium is part of Maritime Experiential Museum and Aquarium or MEMA. Read about MEMA here and the aquarium part here.

Skyride

There are lots of other rides within Sentosa island that isn’t in Universal Studios. My favorite is the luge ride which is followed by the skyride, which isn’t so great for me, because I’m scared of heights. Look how awkward our smiles are in that picture.

Songs of the Sea

The Songs of the Sea is a musical and light and fireworks extravaganza that is easily the best show in Singapore. I’ve seen it more than ten times because I keep on bringing tourist friends to watch it. It is worth it to watch the look of amazement that play over the faces of those who have seen it for the first time.

There’s more to see in Singapore, but these are just some samples. If you want to see more, just click on the “singapore” tag on the right side.

*Most pictures taken by me, but the watermarked ones were taken by my friend Brian, who kindly agreed to let me use them. He takes amazing pictures, doesn’t he? He shoots like a pro.

—;<@
This post is part of the A to Z Challenge, a blog hop that goes through the alphabet for all the days of April except Sundays. I have decided to go with the theme of Alliterations.