Arrival in Singapore

After a lovely 20 hour flight, including a 1 hour stop in Seoul, we landed in Singapore. Customs was super easy, They let us walk thru without a word. We landed at 2am local time, but since they have a couple hotels inside the airport, we had no trouble getting to our room.

We checked into our Airbnb the next day with no problems, and we were off to explore the benevolent dictatorship of Singapore.

Singapore and Air-Conditioning

The first thing I noticed about Singapore is that it is hot. Situated almost right on the equator, Singapore is hot and muggy. 47% of all energy used in Singapore is devoted to cooling.

just look at all those AC units Gardens by the bay is a large botanical garden near the heart of Singapore. It features a grove of ‘Super Trees’, and two large domed conservatories. In San Francisco there is a tropical flower conservatory. So when I think of a conservatory I think of glass houses designed to be more hot and humid than the outside so plants that need that can survive. So being in Singapore I was kinda dreading these conservatories, because what could possibly need to be hotter and more humid than Singapore already was. But people had highly recommended the conservatories, so we bought tickets and went.

IMG_20160109_145101 (1) These weird tree things, are evaporation towers, providing cooling for… IMG_20160109_133619 …Giant glass domes, with fake mountains inside! It turns out, to my relief, that while conservatories in California simulate Singapore, conservatories in Singapore simulate California.

The first Conservatory is called the Flower dome, and it is designed to mimic a ‘Mediterranean’ spring. There were all kinds of flowers in here that did not seem that exotic to me, and they had a big poinsettia display left over from christmas. They also had all kinds of Cactii, Large Balboa trees, and a grove of Chilean Wine Palm trees. My favorite thing, however was the sign explaining to Singaporeans what a four season climate was.

The Second Conservatory: the ‘Cloud Forest’ was cooler. It was kind of like the matterhorn at disneyland but inside a giant glass dome. It was meant to simulate the tropical rainforests that only form on the cool tops of mountains. The Artificial mountain was covered in spiraling walkways, greenery, flowers, misting nozzles and waterfalls. It was an awesome place.

IMG_20160109_134844 View of the Bay Sands hotel out of the Flower Dome.

Singapore Zoo

Singapore has a pretty decent zoo. They have several colonies of Orangutans, which seem pretty happy. They have a nice refrigerated space for the polar bear. The heat on this day convinced me I needed to buy some shorts.

IMG_20160110_113621

IMG_20160110_111729 Tigers are less graceful than I thought. A couple frames later, He slipped and fell in the water. Food in Singapore

Singapore is famous for its street food, but Singapore is too orderly a city to actually have people selling food on the street. Food in Singapore is found in hawker centers. These are usually open air structures with rows and rows of vendors. Food is pretty cheap, and very delicious. It is an interesting mix of Indian, Chinese, Malaysian and Thai food.

IMG_20160108_120405 Roti Prata and Curry from a hawker center Another thing Singapore is super serious about is the cleanliness of their subway system. After just coming from New York, I was amazed about how pristine the subway was. Also free of durians.

IMG_20160109_121903 Crimes in order of severity. Leaving Singapore

Singapore is linked to the mainland via a causeway and a 15 minute train ride. 15 minutes down. 17 days to go.

IMG_20160110_171103 The first of many trains