Singapore December 2004

My stay in Singapore lasted 4 days, long enough to go to all the places the local tourist maps told you too, but not long enough to find the really neat places to go. The ones you would find if you lived there or spent a couple of weeks just looking for places. I used the train system to get around, I would say from city to city, or town to town, but one of the things I learned about Singapore is that the whole country is more or less one big city. Singapore doesn't really produce anything or so the locals told me, it mostly survives on trade brought in and out of the country by its massive harbors. Singapore is also a hodgepodge of people having been controlled by the British and the Japanese who both brought in people from different countries for cheep labor, as well as all the trading at the ports brings people from all over the world to live there. The main two dominate presences that are easily noticed are the Chinese presence and the Indian, especially if you happen to go to the towns of Chinatown, or Little India, which I did by the way. I tried to go around and see as many of the well known or good places to go to, and for the most part I think I did. At least the city places with the big shopping areas and such, but truthfully I just don't that much get into cities or shopping especially by myself. So I would just get to these places and walk around and look at the buildings until I had seen enough, and then go to the next place on my list and do the same thing. I did do a bit of shopping but not in any of the big stores or shopping areas. They all have all the same things I could buy back in the States if I wanted too. Instead I shopped at the small stores owned by private people, looking for things that even if they weren't made in Singapore would at least remind me that I had been there. I also visited one of the main attractions/tourist traps which is its own little island called Sentosa. The island was originally used as a fort by the British but when Singapore became its own country it more or less became and attraction park and resort. I spent the better half of one after noon there seeing the touristy attractions and decided to come back the next evening to walk around the many gardens that are on the grounds, and to take pictures of water fountain laser show that they put on every night. Having been rained out every afternoon I had been there, this on my last day I thought that I would arrive at about 4:00pm after the rains normally stopped and would have a nice walk around the gardens. Much to my disappointment though they seem to close the gardens up early around 5:00pm to 6:00pm so by the time I had walked through one garden they had closed the gates to the rest. Oh well I didn't have much else to do, so I went and got something to eat. Road a cable car that went to the main land and back, and then sat down to wait for the water fountain show. To be completely honest I don't know that I was that impressed with Singapore, perhaps it was just that I didn't know what to do when I got there, or maybe I'm just not a good tourist. But I did find one place that I toughly enjoyed while I was there and made a point on my way back to stop at again. That being Little India, to me it sets itself apart from the rest of the city, being more of a cultural area catering to a specific group of people. It offered a different sort of fair, it wasn't all fashion clothing or the newest electronics. But rather more a turn back to the more traditional wares that the Indian people used every day. From offering the fabrics to make sari's to the foods and spices to silk blankets, or fine wool scarves and hand painted pictures and frames. In all I guess Little India was the type of place I was looking for and they type of place I enjoy visiting. A place that has more flavor and texture to it, more of personality than just big tall buildings full of all the things I can buy anywhere and everywhere in the would.

Also as a positive ending to this little story, on my flights and other travels it became very apparent to me that Americans are indeed fat, ugly, ill mannered, hostile, rude, closed minded people. you can easily tell when a person is an American by watching for these traits, and also notice that they will complain constantly about anything and everything and do so quite loudly, and repeatedly tell other people how stupid they are. So the next time your traveling outside the United States, please remind yourself that you are in fact outside the United States and things are different there, and you are the guest in their county no matter how much you paid for the hotel or the ticked. And please also, your giving the rest of us decent folk a bad reputation.