Asia Lite: A Whirlwind Weekend in Singapore

Here’s a riddle for you:  what place is both Asia and not Asia, tiny in geography and mighty in wealth, a steamy place one degree separated from the equator yet run with cool Swiss-like efficiency?

It’s gotta be Singapore, the most clean, efficient, safe, sparkly place we’ve ever been, and that includes Disney World.

Singapore is a tiny city-state on the very end of the long peninsula of land that encompasses Thailand and Malaysia.  It has a deep port, low taxes, and so much wealth — the WSJ recently reported it to be the richest city in the world — that we figured a Lamborghini or Ferrari must come standard with citizenship.  Of course, you’d have to pay about $50,000 USD at an auction just for the right to own that car, a sales tax of 100% of the purchase price, plus pay usage fees to drive on streets in the city center, along with all the normal costs of car ownership.  As you can imagine, the streets are free of congestion.  Thankfully, Singapore has excellent public transit.  The buses and metro are clean, efficient, well laid out, and run on time.  And the city is seriously clean.  You could probably eat off the pavement.

 

Of course, Singapore is also well known for its safety, owing to its strict laws.  No jay walking. No gum chewing.  This is a place where they’ll cane theives.  Our immigration form clearly stated in all caps DEATH TO DRUG TRAFFICKERS.

This is so different from the buzzing, gritty, chaotic feel of every other city we have been in Southeast Asia.  Singapore would be the perfect introduction to, or escape from, the rest of the subcontinent.

The itinerary

We only had a weekend to spend in Singapore, and wanted to stick to our budget-travel principles as much as possible.  For others looking to do the same, here was our whirlwind weekend in Singapore.

Day 1

Our bus from Melaka (an odious place) dropped us off in the middle of nowhere somewhere on Singapore island.  Luckily, the subway (MRT) is inexpensive, easy to use, and goes almost everywhere in the city.  We were able to quickly catch the MRT to Chinatown and check into our accommodations for two nights: the Beary Good Hostel.

You won’t be finding inexpensive hotel rooms in this city.  This was the first time we’ve stayed in dorms on our entire trip (4 months in at this point) and it was still our most expensive accommodation yet.  Still, the Beary Good lives up to its name — it’s clean, comfy, well-located near a subway station, just a bit cramped.

We were starved, so finding lunch was priority No. 1.  Here’s the great news about Singapore that makes it better than a lot of other first-world destinations — eating well will not cost you a fortune.  The hawker centers scattered around town are clean, easy to navigate, and serve delicious, authentic food on the cheap.  The city basically took all the road stalls found in other SE Asian cities, cleaned them up and moved them indoors. Very different from the many meals we’ve eaten hunched over kindergarten stools, praying to avoid death by exhaust asphyxiation immediately or food poisoning later. The hawker centers are a perfect example of how Singapore is “Asia Lite.”

Maxwell Road Hawker Center was right down the road and we stopped in for some amazing chicken and rice at the Tian Tian stall.  A deceptively bland looking dish of poached chicken over rice cooked in the resulting chicken broth — this was simple, delicious, and judging from the long queue, the most popular dish in the hawker center.

Appetites sated, we decided to buy into one of those hop on, hop off bus tours.  Not normally our style, but it allows you to see the highlights conveniently in a short time.  We got an up-close view of Orchard Road (Singapore’s mega-upscale shopping district) and the taller-than-the-London-Eye Singapore Flyer.

We did “hop off” to poke around the storied Raffles Hotel.  Beautiful place, but we skipped the $30 US made-from-mix Singapore Sling in the Long Bar.

We took the bus around to Merlion Park on Marina Bay, the center of the city with beautiful urban views on one side and the magnificent Marina Bay Sands towers on the other.  Every skyscraper looked brand new — it probably was.  One of the constants of the skyline were cranes and construction equipment putting up even more new skyscrapers.

 

As it got dark, we migrated next door to the Esplanade arts center.  In such an expensive city, it’s good to know that the Esplanade offers first-rate free concerts.  We saw some wonderful acts:  an Australian Catholic choir, a South African spiritual ensemble, and a singer from India who performed 800-year-old Sufi poems.

Dinner was next door to the Esplanade at another hawker center (maybe you’ve picked up that we didn’t do too much walking in sweltering Singapore), this one appropriately named “Gluttons Bay.”  Seated among our people, we ordered some Filipino grilled pork belly,  Chinese chicken wings, stir fried veggies, and the peculiarly named “carrot cake.”  It’s actually stir-fried cubes of Daikon radish cakes with eggs and scallions.  Really tasty!

Day 2

We had to visit the top-flight Singapore Zoo while we were in town.  It takes about an hour to get there on public transit:  take the MRT Red line to Ang Mo Kio, from where you’ll follow clear signage to the queue for Bus No. 138.  Less than $4 SGD per person!

One of the most amazing things about the Singapore Zoo is their open habitats.  Very few animals are in anything resembling a cage, and many of the monkeys can come right up to the walkways!

After the zoo, we headed back into town, to Clarke’s Quay where our destination was the Brewerkz Microbrewery.  After months of rice lagers, imagine our delight to find a good double IPA brewed in house and other bottles imported from some of our favorite craft breweries back home.

Dinner was back at Maxwell Road for some thick, yummy pork congee, or rice porridge, and some egg custard tarts and lime juices.

Day 3

Our flight from Singapore to Phuket, Thailand was scheduled for 1:00 pm, so we decided to head down to the airport early to check out Changi International Airport. Singapore has what must be the best airport in the world.

Its bathrooms have views of the tarmac and are immaculate (and you can even rate your toilet experience!).  This place has a butterfly garden, spas, a rooftop pool, a free movie theater and video game lounge, free wi-fi, even an enormous slide. Why can’t all airports be this cool?

And of course, even the airport had great food. Our AirAsia check-in agent told us to avoid the greasy Western stuff in the main terminal and head to the staff canteen, itself resembling an indoor hawker center in the basement of Terminal 1. It’s open to the public and has delicious, cheap eats.

Singapore blew us away — it is an unbelievable place, an urban planner’s dream come true.  This is the first place we’ve visited on this trip where we would seriously consider moving.  Sure, it’s hellishly hot, incredibly expensive, and 10,000 miles from home.  But they’d throw in a Ferrari.

The budget

We aren’t doing one of our usual budget posts for Singapore since we were just there for two nights, but here’s a sampling of costs you might expect on a visit of your own.

• Lodging: We stayed at the Beary Good Hostel in a 10-person dorm. Our first night there was a Saturday, where prices are a bit higher at $21 US/person. Prices dipped to about $16 US/person on Sunday night. Still, it was our first stay in a hostel dorm and also our most expensive accommodation yet.
• Food: We averaged $40 US/day on food and drinks, eating exclusively at kopitiams (the local coffee shops in Chinatown) for breakfast and hawker centers for lunch and dinner.
• Transportation: We averaged about $15 US/day on metro tickets. We didn’t need to take any taxi rides.
• Immigration: There are no immigration/visa fees for US residents in Singapore.
• Activities: Our hop on/hop off bus tour was about $15 US/person, and tickets to the Singapore Zoo were $22 US/person.

We spent about $300 US for two people over 3 days and 2 nights in Singapore, roughly double what we’ve averaged per day in the rest of Southeast Asia. Still, we think Singapore is a worthy addition to any Southeast Asian itinerary — if only for that amazing airport!