It seems like I just landed in Singapore, but in reality 3 weeks here have already flown by. This is in part to being so busy with school and exploring Singapore.
The first week, was really busy both with school introductions and sightseeing. I had the chance to meet up with my classmates for the first time. There are 18 exchange students in total, from all over the world. We had some both formal and informal introductions during the week, which included a trip out to Clarke Quay on Friday night.
Throughout the first week I got to see some new parts of Singapore, which included
Little Arab, Little India and
Chinatown, all very bustling, interesting and diverse places!
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| Little Arab |
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| Haji Lane in Little Arab |
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| Temple in Little India |
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| Chinatown |
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| Sri Mariamman Temple in Chinatown |
I also had the opportunity to visit the famous
Gardens by the Bay, which lies behind Marina Bay Sands. The area consists of a large area of gardens representing, each having plants and decorations from different Asian nations.
The garden also has 2 indoor domes, which you have to pay to visit. The one climate controlled flower garden is the largest glass greenhouse in the world. It is decorated with different themes through out the year. I managed to visit at the tail end of the Christmas display. The other dome is a cloud forest, which is home to the worlds largest indoor waterfall. It houses an indoor mountain, which teaches you about the different levels/areas of a forest.
The final attraction at Gardens by the Bay is the Supertree Grove. The Supertrees are vertical gardens which provide different ecological benefits, including solar power. At night the Supertrees light up, and 3 times throughout the evening there is a light show to music. This is definetley a must see!
The second week was when classes started, but there was still time to do further sightseeing. With a classmate, we visited the
Asian Civilization Museum, which had some cool historical artifacts from different parts of Asia. One of the most interesting was a display of artifacts recovered from an old shipwreck in the Indian sea.
One of the other cool sights this week was the famous Singapore Merlion. The body symbolizes Singapore's beginnings as a fishing village and the head represents Singapore’s original name, Singapura, or ‘lion city’ in Malay. The
Merlion offers some fun pictures to be taken.
One of the other touristy things to do, is to take a
boat ride around Marina Bay. The boat takes you up the river past Boat Quay and Clarke Quay, and you can see a lot of attractions along the ride.
One of the attractions I had heard a lot about was the
night safari at the Zoo. Most animals are most active at night, so it makes for a good sight to see. You can walk or take the safari tram around. On the tram, the animals come really close and almost look fake in some regard.
At the direction of a classmate, we found out that on Sunday evening the
Israel Symphony Orchestra was putting on a free performance in the
botanical gardens. We went and enjoyed the music in the park as the sun set. Unfortunately, we weren`t smart enough to bring a picnic like the others surrounding us at the park, but it was still a lot of fun.
On our way to school during my third week (second week of classes), we stumbled across
Haw Par Villa. I had heard a bit about it as an old abandoned theme park. The free theme park, depicts Chinese mythology and folklore. Although I didn`t understand much of the folklore, the colorful fun statues has made this one of my favorite sites in Singapore.
Tiger Beer is the signature beer of Singapore, so we decided to take a trip to the local
Tiger Brewery. Having been on brewery tours before, the basic fundamentals of this tour were nothing special. The grounds in itself were very cool though, with oversize beer bottle models and a pub looking like it came out of the 1950`s. We were also very fortunate to get taken over to do some taste testing at Archipelago Craft Brewery.
Fort Canning Park is a popular landmark in Singapore, which lies in the middle of the Central Business District. Historically it was known as the forbidden hill. This is due to the belief that ill will befall any who entered the hill as it is the place where
Sang Nila Utama the king of
Singapura were laid to rest as well as a palace which once stood on the hill since the 13th century before Portuguese raiders burned down the island in 1619. On Saturday I walked around the part, which was full of people running, picnicking and some practicing yoga. Remnants of historical landmarks/buildings are still present in the park.
The
Southern Ridges is a 10-kilometre stretch of green space spanning the hills of some of Singapore’s most popular parks and gardens, which are connected by picturesque ridges and pathways. There are wire bridges/walkways suspended between the trees that offers great views of the forest and the wildlife within it.
From the Southern Ridges you can reach the
Henderson Waves. The Henderson Waves, a distinctive wave-like structure consisting of a series of undulating curved 'ribs', is Singapore’s highest pedestrian bridge.
Onwards from Henderson Waves, I reached
Mount Faber. One of the highest points in Singapore, it overlooks Sentosa island and part of the city.
My last stop of the weekend was
Sentosa Island, with a group of classmates. Sentosa is like the Disneyland of Singapore. The island is divided into 3 different "sections". The first is the real touristy area called Resorts World, which houses Universal Studios, an Aquarium and a waterpark. The middle section has a giant version of the famous Singapore Merlion. The last section has a line of beaches on the ocean. On this day we started in the beach section. One of the main attractions here is a luge track. You take the chairrail up to the top of the hill and then zoom down on the luges. We had some fun racing down the track, with loser buying ice cream.
After our fun on the luge track we walked along the beach and then continued to walk around the other parts of the island.
To cap off the third week in Singapore, we headed to one of the most iconic buildings in the city:
Marina Bay Sands. At the top of the tower, there is a bar that is usually very exclusive, but on Sunday`s before 8:00 there is no cover charge and they let up on the dress code. We dressed in the best clothes that we had, which isn`t much that you bring to travel around South East Asia with. Drinks at the bar are insanely expensive (around $30/drink), but we figured it was a once in a lifetime expense!
With that the first 3 weeks in Singapore came to a close and what a ride it has been so far!
