South-East Asia

WHOAA, SINGAPORE IS COOL, and this is going to be a long chapter! Singapore fully lives up to its reputation as a garden city, is very green, extremely clean, and very well organized. There is a quick and easy to understand metro system, with modern, quiet trains going every three to four minutes and a tourist-friendly location finder. And we were much impressed by its skyline silhouette, so sorry if we repeat ourselves here with the pictures.

We stayed in Little India, which feels like a whole quarter from Mumbai placed into Singapore. Shops selling saris, Indian movies and karaoke songs (which can be quite a torture), spice shops, sacrifice flowers and religious items. Finding affordable accommodation is not easy in Singapore, as even two beds in a 12-bed dormitory room will cost about 15 dollars, and that's only if you are lucky to find a free one. We were not, so we didn't complain when we found a Chinese hotel for some 30 USD, which seemed to be in a quiet surroundings, and with no construction works in the neighborhood (we have become increasingly sensitive to that issue, as in half of the places we visited so far we got the wake-up call delivered by sledgehammers and drilling equipment). It wasn't meant to be... At half past five the muezzin started to call in the faithful for prayer. So we still search for the one place in Asia where we wake up by our own.

We used our time for extensive city walks, and with its skyline, harbor quays, British colonial style architecture, an impressive zoo, Chinatown, a forest-sized botanical and orchid garden, time is running here. The metro system makes going around easy and a pleasure, and it also helps that the main language is English and people are utmost friendly and helpful. The calm and respectful way people treat each other here really impressed us. No shouting, no pushing in the queue, people first let others get out of the train before they get in, no littering, no graffitis... Though Singapore is supposed to have very tough laws and expensive fines, we didn't see a single police man during our stay, so I assume it's the successful combination of right attitude and the manifold awareness campaigns that are run throughout the city.
Thank you for not smoking here, don't litter, be polite to others, make way, wash your hands very often, check your blood sugar, 5 measures to limit Dengue fever spreading, use public transport to boost your individual carbondioxide balance, and so on. We counted at least seven of these campaigns, the most remarkable probably the anti-terrorism campaign that is shown on screens in the metro, with quite some impressing pictures from past years metro bombings in Spain, Britain, and India. It feels a bit like brainwashing and Orwell-like supervision where everyone who somehow doesn't fit in is reported by eager citizens who are encouraged to do so.

A walk in the quay area in the evening is an exciting experience, as the bars and restaurants line up along the water in front of the silhouette of the skyline, with restaurant staff fighting for your attention by gracious happy hour offers - a beer for 10 dollars, for example. Partying out here is a bit on the pricy side, as is the whole city, so we skipped that part and spent some time listening to life music outside a bar and a life concert at the Esplanade Art Museum.

The botanical garden is a green marvel. It's a huge park-like arrangement with lakes, original rainforests and popular public picnic places that enjoy a lot of visitors. Particularly interesting are the orchid collections - they cross-bread new species of orchids for honored guests here; so if you bring it to some public popularity some day, there might even be an orchid with your name in the VIP area.

On our last day in Singapore we went to Sentosa Island, which is the Southern-most point of continental Asia and apart from that a man-made island-sized entertainment complex with beach resorts, rollercoaster-rides, 3D- and 4D-movie theaters, dolphin shows, maritime wildlife presentations, golf court and park-like arrangements. The place is connected to the mainland by a cable car in some 70 meters height, giving a great view on the harbor area and the city as whole.

Sentosa Island Beach

To sum it up, Singapore would be the place where one could live and work quite if only I could find some dark bread and a piece of cheese and sausage to put on it! I start to long for some German-style breakfast!