Singapore

We’ve been in Singapore (Lion city) for 3 days and we’ve learned so much about this fascinating place that it is going to be hard to convey it all to you so I’ll have to make some generalizations. And on top of that we are in the midst of 7 very packed days with little time even to do laundry much less work on pictures so please forgive my brevity here and maybe do as I plan to do and read a book on the interesting history of Singapore.

Singapore is a “unitary parliamentary republic” but that’s about all we learned about the government except that the one party has been in power for over 50 years and they control just about everything. None of the guides seemed to want to talk about it…hummm. Eighty five percent of the citizens live in government owned housing, numbered like this one.

The city is the most modern and technologically advanced that we have seen on this trip (and maybe will ever see). The city is beautiful and they intend to keep it that way by mandating that every building be refurbished every 50 years. (And a grave can only be used for 15 years before the body must be exhumed and reinterred in a”mass grave” of sorts. There are some old and lovely buildings mixed in with the new but, as per the rules, they are well maintained and mostly used as museums.

We’re told that the government mandates a mixture of races and ethnicities in every section of the city so that everyone learns to live together in harmony but I found it interesting that our guides, who were clearly Chinese, talked about the Chinese as though they were another race. This huge, colorful building which is now a community center of sorts, the guide told us, used to be an enormous police station (which employed no Chinese policemen) because there was so much crime among the Chinese.

Old and new are mixed in beautiful ways, almost as if an artist did the planning. These old shop houses (a shop on the ground floor and homes in the one or two stories above) along the river and in Chinatown have been here since the large Chinese population first settled here.

Chinatown was colorful and full of places to eat but we didn’t have time 🙂

Although most of the city state in on the main island, Singapore is composed of 63 islands, many of which are single purpose areas — military training, trash disposal, picnicking, etc. It was established in 1819 as an outpost of the East India Company but long before a Thai prince had come ashore and thought he saw a lion on the beach; hence their fascination with lions (which of course never lived in Asia) and their park featuring the merlion.

If Singapore has anything it has rules. Littering is punishable with fines for the first two offenses and humiliating community service for the third. We were shocked beyond belief when on our third day here we actually saw a piece of litter!

And, going along with their very clean and neat city is their dedication to living in a garden. Apparently the city has debated with itself as to whether they would be a “garden city” or “a city in a garden” but whatever the outcome they sure know how to maintain a garden. The National Orchid Garden was the most beautiful and densely planted garden I have ever seen. I could have spent a whole day there and not seen it all and I was overwhelmed with the amount of vegetation they crammed in so artistically and the health of every specimen. The “cool garden” housed those that grow at higher, cooler elevations and we especially enjoyed sharing their climate while in this hot and humid city.

We also visited the Gardens by the Bay which were equally impressive. We only had time for one of the gardens there and it was spectacular in its largest-of-its-kind glass conservatory. There were many full size trees inside; one an ancient olive tree moved there from Spain, African baobabs and others, and Chinese new year having just passed, there were lots of dragons about.

Some very clever person had created animals out of pieces of wood for each area’s display. These two bighorn sheep made me feel at home. And outside the conservatory these ants made me smile.

Sheep and ants weren’t the only “fake” nature here in this garden paradise, though. The supertrees are an icon and I was glad to finally see them, both at night and in the daylight. They are not just decorative but they perform various tasks such as generating solar power and acting as air venting ducts for the two conservatories. They each have thousands of real plants growing around their “trunks”.

There are 18 supertrees, all at the Gardens by the Bay and close to the iconic Marina Bay Sands Hotel which, like many buildings around the city, has trees growing on its roof. We got up on that roof and had a great view all around. Notice the ships waiting their turn at this important container hub, the red-roofed private condominiums which only the elite rich can afford, and the lack of traffic on the highways.

The government regulates the number of vehicles on the roads! In order to purchase a car one must have a license to purchase one — not a drivers license but a buyers license! And it is not cheap!!! It lasts for ten years at which time the car will be sent off to another country which tolerates older cars and the owner will have to start the process of getting a license all over again. But since the government wants to keep the number of vehicles on the road static that will not necessarily be easy.

And speaking of licenses, we were told that there was much hesitation on the part of the people to have the Sands come in and build their hotel/ casino but the government wanted the thousands of jobs it would bring so the compromise was a license to gamble. Local people must pay $150 per day or $3000 per year to go in to gamble.

Another icon of the city is the cable car which glided silently over our ship day and night and, since we saw them everywhere, I suppose that the orange-squeezing machine which fascinated Dale and our friends was something of an icon, too; four oranges squeezed before your eyes for less than $2.

We liked Singapore for many reasons but would not like to live here for many others.