First full day in Singapore

7th Aug 2007

Spent the day mostly seeing some of the sights. They have a 2 day tourist pass you can buy which covers you for free entry into a whole load of places, as well as the use of a hop on, hop off bus and a Duck tour (like the one they have in Boston or the Viking splash in Dublin). After doing the duck tour, I headed for Chinatown which is worth a visit. I stopped at the Chinatown Heritage Centre which gives you a feel for what life was like for the Chinese who arrived en masse here in Singapore in search of a better life. Probably not all that different an experience from the Irish who left during the famine. Away from home, a lot of them were lured into spending what little money they were able to earn on opium or gambling.

Having skipped lunch, by the time I stopped for food at 7pm I was absolutely starving. I was down at the Esplanade, nearby where the National Day celebrations will be held over the next few days. I found one of the many outdoor hawker centre's where you can sample all kinds of cuisine. While trying to figure out what I was going to have, I was offered a sample of some soup which was really tastey, so I decided to go for that. It was as lot like the hot pot I tried in Beijing, where you get a whole load of raw ingredients (meat and veg) and you cook them yourself. The cooking takes place in a little clay pot which sits on top of a clay holder with charcoal burning away to keep your pot boiling away. Plenty of eating and drinking in it, all for about 3 Euro. Apparently eating and shopping are two of the most popular pasttimes here, certainly eating good food is really cheap.