Almanac Travel: Welcome to Singapore
Singapore 3/1/26
So after twelve hours we finally made it to Singapore via a short stop in Jo-Burg.
Our driver, Ben, was a former career diplomat who had to resign due to a cancer diagnosis, however he’s on the mend and was the perfect guide to tap into whilst driving into the CBD.
The first thing you notice about Singapore is it’s well known cleanliness. This is no fallacy. From the inside of Changi airport down the streets to our hotel, it’s utopia.
The paradox between Jo-Burg and here was duly noted. Singapore is a stable for the rich and ‘well to do’ of the world. We are a stone’s throw from Orchard St which reminded us of Ginza in Japan. Wall to wall high-end products.
I saw a couple of Swiss watches that were worth $600,000 and $800,000 respectively. I wanted to enter the shop, signal my interest and then ask where the house is that I’m getting with the watch?
Our hotel, The Goodwood Park, was built in 1900 and was recently bought and renovated by a local movie director. It’s seriously classy and beautifully appointed.
I’m very uncomfortable in this environment. This afternoon I was lying on a poolside lounge chair looking like Ray Winstone in the opening to Sexy Beast.
The hotel sits amongst the shiny bricks and glass of new Singapore and looks like it’s holding up a middle finger to progress. I’m thinking about buying a pith helmet to wander the corridors in.
Singapore demands a minimum of 30% green on the island and they are kings of sustainability. It’s not just the scale of the gardens but the quality. Every edge and branch trimmed to within an inch of its life.
Of course, Singapore has always been a major commercial hub in Asia and there were about hundred giant ships in the water. It’s quite a sight seeing such an armada especially from the top of the Marina Sands Park today.
This extraordinary piece of architecture is synonymous with Singapore and it has divided opinions. Personally, I love it’s quirkiness and it oversees a much broader and magnificent section of Singapore known as the Gardens By The Bay.
The view was amazing but scary for me. Table Top Mountain was almost surreal being 3700ft but this was only fifty-five stories. I say only, but for someone shit scared of heights, it feels unsafe and more likely I was going to die, especially when the wind picked up. That’s obviously not the case and the crowd, along with Lynda, lapped up the views.
Yesterday was a massive day. I reckoned we walked 20km in thongs, including getting lost a couple of times. I really miss the old paper maps.
We started at The Singapore Contemporary Art Museum where they were running a Biennale. It was OK without blowing our socks off but there are a number of installations around the city to check out also. An opportunity to put Lynda back in her box. :)
One exhibit that did catch our attention was from the crazy Asian performance artist Sam Hsieh who locked himself in isolation for a year in New York. The only thing similar we’ve seen was in the Moma PS1 gallery in Queens where another performance artist lived in isolation in the basement attaching gold leaf to the plumbing and heat pumps using saliva and semen. We didn’t go anywhere near it.
The Museum is in a relatively ugly part of the city opposite the docks. Adjacent to The SCA is an offshoot of The National Gallery which housed a beautiful exhibition of iconic Singaporean artist Chen Cheng Mai.
The buildings may look dodgy from the outside as they are old distribution warehouses but the interiors are huge and glimmering as you expect here.
From there it was a bus to the Gardens By The Bay and a visit to The Bay Cloud Forest which is stunning.
Around four to five o’clock, the crowds slowly start moving in around the Super Trees for the nightly show. I absolutely love these trees, as do the rest of Singapore, because by seven o’clock about half a million of them grabbed every vantage point for the light show.
The lights from the trees dance with classical musical accompaniment pounding out from their trunks for ten minutes. It’s quite a sight and that was that for yesterday. We were stuffed.
Farewell for now.
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About Ian Wilson
Former army aircraft mechanic, sales manager, VFA footballer and coach. Now mental health worker and blogger. Lifelong St Kilda FC tragic and father to 2 x girls.
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