Thoughts on Singapore

There were a lot of things I’ve done in Singapore during my week there. From April 7-11th I had the pleasure of flying over to Singapore to visit some friends, explore a new country and eat some delicious native delicacies. There was a lot I did and so I’ll try to cover a brief overview of what I did each day.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

During this day I flew out from Ninoy Aquino Airport Terminal 3 to Singapore direct from Manila and arrived in Singapore around 5pm. I had to wait a long time at customs but once I got out of the airport and exchanged my money and got myself a new SIM card with a new Singapore cell number I was able to head to my hostel which was the Drop Inn located on Lavender street. I located a shuttle to take me directly to the Drop Inn where I checked in. It was a backpacking hostel and my first time staying in a place like that so it was an interesting experience. A lot of international travelers were there in the living area just watching TV or on the internet just chilling out. The caretaker who was Singaporean welcomed me and I have to say she was pretty cute! She gave me my keys to my room and I was set. I placed all my things down and then went out to meet my friend Elsie for dinner.

I headed to the nearest MRT station which happened to be Boon Keng station where I met my friend Elsie. Elsie took me to the East Lagoon Food Village which was a hawker centre near the water. It was a pretty nice place and she let me experience first hand what kind of food Singapore offered. There was a healthy mix of everything, including Indian, Malasian and Chinese cuisine all put together. The food I tried included Rojak, Tulang, and different types of Satae which were accompanied by two large cups of sugarcane juice. Everything was quite scrumptious! She then drove me around the city to take in the sights at night for a bit and I even explored what a local 7-11 and McDonald’s was like. They were all updated and very modern looking. And the best part is that they had free wireless internet at every important restaurant around Singapore! It was useful to keep in touch with friends during that time since Singapore was connected to the net almost everywhere I went. Around 1am I returned to the Drop Inn where Elsie helped me plan my next day, which turned out to be the Singapore Zoo.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

I planned for this day to visit the Singapore Zoo. This time a few Singapore Wonderfuls decided to accompany me and so I had a great time. The Singlish they used was very daunting at first, especially since I was only able to understand 2/3 of what they were saying when they spoke it. However, it was very fun to hang out with them. They toured me around and were my escort around the zoo while I oogled the animals. We walked, ate at a local KFC at the northern part of the zoo and covered every exhibit within about 5 hours.

That night I met up with Elsie again to explore the Night Safari, which turned out to be a somewhat nice experience. The night safari was interesting, but I couldn’t take many good pictures mostly because no flash photography was allowed. There was a tram ride which I took half of the way around the park which was also interesting for a good 20-30 minutes but it was just okay. Some of the animals in the exhibits couldn’t be seen which was disappointing, especially since I paid extra for the park. There was also an animal show which lasted about 30 minutes which was also okay. Some of the animals weren’t cooperative that night and didn’t want to come out so some of the show didn’t work out. The host was very enthusiastic though, so that made the show worth it. I found out that a huge boa constrictor was present just in the row in front of me which freaked me out a little, but it was a great experience to see the animals up close like that.

Later on my friend took me out to a place that sold Roti Prata, which is a famous and simple Indian dish made up of specially cooked Indian bread. There were many things to choose from in terms of filling or the way it was made but I ended up with a Roti Prata filled with mushroom and also one that was just plain. It was served with a side of curry to dip the bread in which was a great accompaniment. Elsie on the other hand ordered a Tissue Plaster which was this huge tower of Indian bread with the inside filled with a layer of sugar and the entire cone shape covered in chocolate sauce. It was a great sweet snack! Later on that night I also ended up visiting the local university which was an amazing place in general. I’d never seen such a modern university with so many facilities inside it before. They had their own hospital, dentist facilities and enough hostels for most of the students. Their library and performing arts center was awesome too! It reminded me of the New York City University campus except more compact and more accessible. Also that night we also hit up a local supermarket where I bought some Hainanese Chicken Rice mix and Elsie bought me some chili sauce to accompany the meal. I will definitely try out the recipe soon and let you know how it goes. :)

Friday, April 9, 2010

During this day I decided to go off on my own and see the local city sights. I also aimed to go to Sentosa which is a separate island to the south of the Singaporean country. I went off to take the Boon Keng MRT to Bugis to see what it would be like there. I explored the place and there was a huge open market full of Chinese goodies and I even found a hawker centre there as well! After buying some souvenirs I ended up at that hawker centre looking to try the famous Hainanese Chicken Rice dish that people here have been raving about. I found a stall that sold it and found that it was delicious! I paired it with a fresh banana shake and the meal was just fantastic. As simple as it was with just a plate of bok choy, chili sauce, boiled chicken and rice infused with chicken flavor as well as a small bowl of soup, it was definitely filling and quite delicious! I know there are different versions, but the one I found there was just awesome. I can’t wait to try the other kinds next time.

I visited Sentosa which every Singaporean says is a tourist trap, which I have to say is pretty much correct. I paid about $36 SGD for a package to ride on 4 attractions and also had to pay an extra $3 SGD to get onto the island. I got to visit their version of the Merlion which is much larger than the one found near the Esplanade and you could look over the top of it and through the mouth. I ended up buying pictures of myself there so I could have a little souvenir. Later on I visited the Images of Singapore exhibit which was basically a large walking museum of how Singapore developed as a country. It was pretty interesting, but I could see it being very boring for kids and people who don’t like to read. I also went on an attraction they called CineBlast, which was basically a 3D movie you watched while on a moving contraption. Their theme at that time was for an “extreme log ride” and that it was… but I couldn’t really see what it had to do with Singapore other than just being another ride at a park. After that I hit up my last attraction which was the Tiger SkyRide which was a great experience (although it was only for about 15 minutes). The ride went up extremely high so that I could see a lot of the Singapore city line from more then 50 stories. It was the highest point in Singapore so I could see a lot, but I could also see that Sentosa itself was under major construction. I think about 1/3 of it was still being renovated or built. I eventually left Sentosa with a little bit of a bad feeling in my mouth just because I didn’t think it was worth much money and it seemed relatively boring. But as my friend Elsie says, SENTOSA stands for “So Expensive, Nothing TO See Also”. Haha, it’s funny and it’s correct!

Later that night I met up with Elsie again to go to dinner at an interesting Indian restaurnat called Annalakshmi. It was a vegetarian restaurant where you could eat as much as you wanted and also pay as much as you wanted. It was definitely an interesting place and the food was great, but I wondered how people could make money on such a concept. The restaurant was really nice though and the food was amazing so I left a good amount I think.

Later on we tried hitting up a jazz bar. Unfortunately the jazz bar wasn’t playing any jazz so we ended up at the Max Brenner Chocolate Bar where we chose a chocolate waffle covered with ice cream and topped with hazelnut. It was really yummy. Although it was a little expensive it was a great dessert to talk over. We ended up not going to the jazz bar later on and decided to take some pictures at the Esplanade and at the Signaporean famous Merlion which is a symbol of Singapore. It’s a statue of a lion’s head on a mermaid’s body. Interesting though, so I took a picture with it! After that I had to go home because I was extremely tired and since it was my last night seeing Elsie, I said good-byes before heading to the Drop Inn for my last night there before my Sunday flight.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

This day I checked out of the Drop Inn and said good-bye to many of the new people that I had met there. For my last night in Singapore I was going to meet up with my friend Calli from Indonesia who was staying over her friend’s apartment in Singapore. It was an empty apartment and so she said I could stay over for my last night in SG. Calli was only going to be in Singapore until Sunday as well, so we shared it for awhile. I took a cab to her place which turned out to be really nice! We then head to Orchard Road together to grab some little lunch at ION the large, up-scale mall there. After that we split to meet our other group of friends. I met up with Emma, Ming, Darren, Hao, Shanel and Amanda since they wanted to take me ice-skating. They took me to the Singapore stadium which happened to be another mall with an ice-skating rink, bowling alley and other facilities as well. I went ice-skating for 2 hours which turned out to be fun, but my friends Emma and Ming who also accompanied me didn’t know how to really skate, so I taught them!

Later on they would take me to Raffles Place where I met another friend, Hui Yi who was gracious enough to take me and my other friends (including Calli) to dinner. We initially thought we were going to be eating at the hawker centre near Raffles Place, but Shanel and the others decided to head over to Suntec City which was another high-class mall with some great eating options. We ended up meeting Calli there and eating at a Chinese venue, which was nice. We had a wonderful gathering there and talked about random things–everything from Wonder Girls to our upcoming future plans. The food was alright, albeit a little expensive and the service was really mediocre. I really would’ve enjoyed more a big dinner at a hawker centre since it would’ve been cheaper and we could’ve tried more native delicacies but the dinner was good nonetheless. Later on we headed on over to explore Suntec City and see if we could go bowling or play billiards. We couldn’t do either and settled on going to McDonald’s for Shanel to buy me, Calli and Huiyi some ice cream for dessert. It was extremely sweet of her to do so, and after that we parted ways and said our good-byes. Calli and I headed back to the apartment for our final night in Singapore.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

At this point in time I didn’t do anymore exploring since I was to take my flight from Singapore back to Manila at 10am. Around 8am I said my good-byes to Calli and took a cab to the Changi airport where I took my flight back to Manila. I met up with my cousin’s family to have a late lunch and then headed on home by bus with all my stuff back to Los Banos.

All in all, I had a great time in Singapore. I still missed a few things and didn’t get to go clubbing or taste any alcohol there! That was a little disappointing, but after a few years I will visit Singapore again to taste all the dishes that I missed and visit all the places that I didn’t get to see. Thanks to all my friends over in Singapore for making my week there a blast. I had a lot of fun and when I visit again I’ll definitely be hitting you guys up.

Now I have to deal with more summer class registration problems and everything like that. Ugh, I guess back to the grind for me!

I had a lot of fun… now it’s time to take care of more things for school. Let me know if there’s anything I should visit next time I go! Until next time, peace out!

Celebrations and Tagaytay!

So I told you guys that I had another story coming during my last blog post, and here it is. Today was a special day, just because we did so much. I honestly had a lot of fun these past two days just being on break and today was pretty cool.

After Belle and I got up this morning after recovering from last night’s BBQ I prepared a little breakfast for the two of us (nothing too much though, because we were still full from the night before) mostly consisting of green tea and donuts. After some talking Belle and I decided to go to the college at around 11am to check the results of our Parasitology class. Today was the day we found out if we either passed the course or didn’t. It had been nerve-wracking thinking about the exam since we took it last Friday. We both had our own feelings on how we did on the exam, but didn’t want to say anything about the results because we were afraid that if we did, it would jinx our chances of actually doing well. Silly right?

Belle went home to freshen up a bit before heading to the college and I took the time to do the same. After about an hour we headed to the college to find out our results. I first knocked on Dr. Baticado’s office and asked him if the Parasitology exam results were out. He told me that they were at the college secretary’s office and after that I asked him,

“Did I pass?”

Dr. Baticados shot me a strange look and said,

“Um… I think you’d better go and check the college secretary for yourself.”

That response did not sit right with me at all. So I rushed to the college secretary’s office on the other side of the CVM facility where I happened to crash into Belle. I told her the results were out in the secretary’s office and there we asked for our results. The secretary said in a high-toned voice, “Congratulations! You both passed!” That totally set us off. We were both ecstatic after hearing that. That’s all we’d been wanting to hear for the last 4 days. We started jumping up and down due to our excitement. What a relief! It was such a big weight off our shoulders, believe me…

After that, Belle and I decided to walk home and not take a jeepney and enjoy the feeling of being totally free from exams by just walking through campus. During the 20 minute walk we talked about how it was so nice to hear those words from the secretary’s mouth. We eventually found out that some of our classmates weren’t so lucky… but unfortunately that’s the way things go sometimes. 2nd year proper is nothing to joke about. Belle, me and my other friends worked harder this semester than any other previous semester and it was the time where students usually decided whether or not taking up a course in veterinary medicine was right for them. If one failed at this point, it might cause them to switch to another course or reconsider what they would do with their extra time.

While heading home, I texted everyone I knew about the results. Meanwhile, I invited my friends Jae and Elma again to have lunch with Belle and I. Unfortunately it was be the leftover BBQ from last night. On the bright side though, the food tasted so much better since Belle and I passed! Also, since the salad was allowed to chill in my fridge overnight, it came out tasting better today than it did last night. Jae and Elma eventually came over, helped me eat a little more of the food in my fridge and then we again talked, chilled and just relaxed for a bit.

Jae eventually showed us some interesting Korean music sites and told me of his love of So Nyuh Shi Dae (SNSD or Girls’ Generation), a 9-member South Korean girl pop group that is immensely popular there. He also told me that he prefered SNSD over the Wonder Girls. (Shocking! I think I may have an issue with this… hahaha… joke lang!) The members of SNSD are all very talented and they are also very pretty. But I still prefer my 5-membered Wonder Girls. (A shoutout to WGSpectacle! Woot! Hehehe…)

After that they all went home and we decided to text each other if we wanted to do something that night. Belle was interested in playing billiards with me later that day so that’s exactly what we did. After everyone left I had some time to myself which I just spent surfing the net. After that, Belle stopped over at my place again and then we headed to the university’s student union building to play some billiards. While there I introduced Belle to the game of 8-ball, which is a game that I traditionally played while in high school and college with friends at pool halls. After a few games I was able to lead for a bit, until she introduced me to the game of 9-ball which she is highly skilled at. (I wouldn’t take Belle’s skills for the game for granted. She may look small, but she’s very smooth when using that cue and insanely accurate. I don’t think I’ve ever played with a girl with that much finesse when playing billiards. I guess everyone has their own secret talents.) We only played for an hour because on the way to the billiard hall Jae texted me and asked if we wanted to go to Tagaytay for dinner. I of course said yes… I really wanted to eat anything but BBQ tonight… haha. Of course Belle was invited as well, so we just played for an hour and then headed back home.

During the last 9-ball game we played, we were both done to the last ball and Belle and I were not able to sink the final shot. We were getting a little frustrated so I said,

“Hey Belle. If you make this shot I’ll treat you to dinner.”

She said, “Really?”

I replied, “Of course!”

Belle then prepared for the shot and with an insane amount of power and accuracy smacked the cue ball into the 9-ball and sunk it in the corner pocket. My jaw kind of dropped since the cue ball was in an insane position on the table and I thought that it wasn’t possible to do it. Belle just smiled and I knew that I owed her dinner. I was glad to do so though, because I was thoroughly impressed with her billiard skills. And of course because we both passed Parasitology! Wooooo!

Later on we again split up to go home and freshen up. Tagaytay is cold, so we needed to pick up light jackets and fix ourselves up for the night. Jae and Elma picked me up from the apartment and we picked up Belle. Then we headed to Tagaytay! We reached a really great restaurant after about an hour-and-a-half of driving called Leslie’s. It was a Filipino cuisine restaurant and it was insanely good. The restaurant itself was on a small cliff overlooking a lake and it was absolutely beautiful.

Jae and Elma recommended buying the a large family sized bowl of bulalo (which is a type of Filipino broth with bone marrow, pork and fresh vegetables) and also a large fried fish (I forget the name… sorry). I ordered an Ube shake to go along with the meal which turned out to be extremely yummy and was topped off with a scoop of Ube ice cream. We started off with the soup because like I said before, Tagaytay was pretty cold. And when I say cold, it was just extremely breezy and comfortable. It was the type of weather that I wish we had in Los Banos sometimes so that I wouldn’t have to use my air conditioner so much. The weather reminded me a lot of NY and then I started thinking back to how nice it would be to be back home again.

During the meal we had a good time talking and enjoying the food we ordered. There was a live band going around and when we first arrived at the restaurant the group that they were singing to requested “Nobody” by the Wonder Girls. After hearing the first bars of the song I was surprised and immediately took out my camera to record them singing it. And they were quite good! I will post up the link to the video after I upload it. (*EDIT — IT HAS BEEN UPLOADED! HERE IS THE VIDEO!) It’s was a pretty awesome performance (although in my opinion, Yubin’s rap could’ve used a little work… hehe).

The atmosphere was amazing and it was nice to have a great dinner at a nice restaurant with great weather… and with live music too! There weren’t many people at the restaurant at the time. I think that besides us a total of maybe 10 other people total were eating there. That’s really small considering that the restaurant seemed like it could hold about 300 people minimum. That left us with an intimate and also secluded place to eat, talk and chill.

After our awesome meal, we decided to walk around a little bit before heading off to get dessert. On top of the restaurant was a lookout point that was great for seeing the lake that was below the restaurant itself. There was a small wooden bridge that connected the lower floor of the restaurant to the roof of the building which allowed us to see the view. It was pretty amazing. Later on, everyone started to have fun on the bridge though. We acted like kids and took some wacky pictures, which you’ll see here. Hahaha…

Then we headed to get some dessert. What possessed us to even go and find some dessert after eating BBQ for the last 2 days and eating a huge dinner is beyond me. Jae ended up driving us to Santa Rosa to a little shopping center called NUVALI. NUVALI consisted of a few, high-end stores, reminiscent of places you’d find in Makata, Fort Bonifacio, etc. While there we ended up at a Starbucks and ordered a couple of different flavored frappuccinos, which of course (for me at least), are always tasty and yummy. Coffee drinks are usually good after an amazing meal like the one we just had. Once we ordered, we plopped down on the couches on the second flood of the Starbucks and just started talking. Everything from how school was going, what we wanted to become in the future, what were looking forward to and not looking forward to in the coming semester and similar things like that. By around 11pm though we all started getting sleepy (most likely due to the immense amount of food we had eaten previously) and so Jae drove us all home.

I want to thank Jae, Elma and Belle for being such awesome friends these past few days. Doing things like this are more interesting to me and more fun for me than hanging out in say Manila and just lounging around at the malls. I had an awesome time thus far!

So here’s to the end of the semester and passing all our courses. Congratulations to everyone who has passed, and enjoy your semester break! I’ll see you all on the flip side!