SINGAPORE

March 16, 2011
We arrived in Singapore this morning and went on the City Orientation at 9:30 AM. Our bus guide’s name is Kim and she is full blooded Chinese but she was born in Singapore as was her mother. Her father was born in China and moved to Singapore. Kim told us that Singapore became its own country in the 1960’s. It was started by a Chinese man that wanted to make the perfect city and to do that he said they needed to use their brain power as there is no natural resources here in Singapore. The official language is English and most of the people are bilingual - Kim speaks 4 languages. Singapore is a small island in Malaysia but is a separate country. There are a large number of banks located here as well as other business corporations. Some of the US companies mentioned were McDonalds, KFC, Subway, Wendy’s, Seagate and Medtronic. We were told that we are very safe in Singapore as they do not have much crime or petty theft as the consequences are pretty severe. You can be jailed for littering and if you have too much to drink and try to put your arm around a female you will also be jailed. That law is called something like Offending of Modesty law. If you are caught dealing or doing drugs you will be hanged and it does not matter what country you are from. The unemployment rate is only 2% and so they sometimes need to import workers. Our US dollar is $1.25 to their Singaporean $1.00 which surprises me as their economy is so much better than ours. A lady married to one of the professors here told us at breakfast this morning that she has a few friends that have given up their US citizenship and become Singaporean citizens because it is such a good place to live.

I don’t know if Kim thinks it is so great. She told us she lives in a pigeon coop - meaning a very small flat in a high rise apartment building. There are no slum areas in Singapore, but a lot of apartment buildings where the poorer people live. The people dry their clothes by attaching them to bamboo poles and hanging them outside their window to flap in the wind. Kim called them the Singaporean flags.

Our first stop was at the top of one of the two hills on the island, where we got a panoramic view of the whole city. There are a lot of high rises here and there are cable cars that go from one side to the other. In fact the cable cars were going right over the top of our ship and thru an opening in one of the skyscrapers. I think I heard that it costs $30 to go on that ride, which we will not have time to do as we are here for only one day. Kim told us that we will see a statue in this hill-top park of a Moulion. It has the head of a lion and the tail of a fish as there are no animals on this island, they made up their own.

Our next stop was at the botanical gardens, but the only area Kim wanted us to see was the Orchid garden and we were only allowed 15 minutes there. I think she had a schedule to follow and we were late departing on the bus. Anyway the garden was very lush and green. They had several statues that were completely covered with moss because of the humidity. I had purchased a neck cooler in the ship store, which is a scarf that you soak in water and it swells up and keeps your upper neck and head area cool. You know I do not like hot and humid and of course that is what it is near the equator.

The next place we stopped was a handicraft factory. The people working on the first floor were running machines that cut precious stones and there were artists making items with the stones. We went upstairs to the showroom where there were many pictures made with stones as well as carved figurines etc. There were a lot of pretty items but everything was very expensive and I did not buy anything. The second room was full of jewelry items.

Our 4th stop was at Chinatown where we were going to visit a Hindu Temple. At this point the majority of the people on the bus signed off with our representative from the ship and said they wanted to stay and explore the rest of the city on their own. I did not sign off as Phyllis was staying on the bus and I did not want her to be alone. I walked thru Chinatown and saw some shops I would have liked to browse in but Kim was hustling us along quickly. I did not go into the temple but took some pictures from the outside. Kim said that Hindu is Indian but the temple is in Chinatown and she said they all get along so there is not a problem.

Our last stop was in little India and I was able to make a purchase there before Kim hustled us back to the bus. At this point four more people signed off the bus. Now it was Kim, Steve (leader from the ship), Phyllis, me and one other lady going back to the ship.

We shopped in the mall that is attached to the pier and had lunch at McDonalds. We spent all of our Singaporean money before returning to the ship.

When we got back on the ship we had drinks in Fred and Pat’s room and they were disappointed in their visit in Singapore. The girls especially were disappointed that they did not get to do much shopping, as they were a group of 11 people and it is too hard to keep track of everybody. So I guess Phyllis and I lucked out by staying on the bus until the very end.