Singapore!

... so odd... so very, very odd.

I shall have to cane myself... never made it to Chinatown. Got wrapped up in LIttle India... especially Sim Lim electronics mall... then Orchard Street.... then my hotel... then a little bit of work... then back to Little India... Orchard... my hotel... then off the island... also got a little trumped up by missing out on Batam and Malaysia... damn work!

I spent way too much at Sim Lim... I got a CD/MP3/VCD player and detachable screen for under $100 Sing... that was a steal but I also got another mini 256 MP3 player/recorder, a few electric razors; a bunch of VCDs and some otehr stuff.
I am not into gambling but the idea of sunning myself with beers that were 75 cents (in Batam) and not 10 dollars (in Singapore) was quite appealing...I also loves boats so the ferry ride was also something to look forward to.
The next time I go I be better prepared...
Even though it is a food court, the one in Raffles City was quite good... there is a palce that is cheap that serves halal certified items... I had a huge plate of rice; curry chicken (Malay style); squash/seafood cakes and a coke for $6.80 Sing....

man, I never realized what a fascist state singapore is

Kinda mixed feelings. It reminds me of the Brussels of East Asia in a way because it has this "economic/commercial trade center" feel to it.

I got lucky in the sense that I was hosted one evening by these three sisters who were raised in Singapore who were back there for a family event and we went out to a mediocre dinner mid/high-end dinner spot that cost a fortune, alcohol is like obscenely expensive (US$10-15 for a beer), but then we went clubbing and that was a lot of fun (but again, drink and cab prices are sobering) and the entertainment seemed first-rate (ie, Andy Butler spinning around the time Hercules & Love Affair was blowing up).

What I remember more fondly than the food scene in Chinatown was just going to the nearest residential high-rise building and going to the hawker stands on the first level and feasting for basically nothing (ie, I'll never forget the huge bowls of tan-tan men where the soupmaster hand-pulls noodles in front of you, or a heaping pile of Hainanese Fried Chicken for ~US$1-2.)

USAmericans love to say they're the true melting pot of the world and that idea became laughable on both my trips to South America (which I found far more diverse than North America.) But Singapore (and maybe moreso Malaysia) has incredible diversity that is pretty eye-opening as well.

I'd probably never go back for pleasure but highly recommended for cheap Chinese food.

I've never been but some of the stuff I'm reading is kinda O_O: the internet is censored, free speech is very limited, media is mostly state run, the major political party has been ruling for the past 30-40 years and controls something like 90-95% of the seats in parliament, highest execution rate in asia if not the world...

I mean basically take all the criticisms levied at China and you can see them at play in Singapore, but somehow Singapore gets a free pass...?

that said, I've heard the food there is amazing (probably much much better than low to mid tier HK cuisine)

I'm from malaysia originally but I went to high school in singapore for four years and yeah, it's basically socialism simultaneously at its best and its worst. the state ensures order by making its citizens as comfortable as possible - it's clean to the point of sterility, has one of the lowest crime rates in the world, great public transport, great healthcare, education and housing, high GDP etc. And they've engineered this highly efficient, highly competitive work culture that's evident as early as kindergarten - the pressure that singaporean schools put on their students is just ridiculous (it's the only country i know of in the world where fast food joints like burger king carry signs that say "No studying" lol.)

i get the sense that the citizens actually like it this way... the majority of sporeans i know do lead fairly comfortable lives and don't have much complaint over how their country is being run.

and while political dissent is shut down in the media, they're surprisingly frank about everything else - I mean, apart from thailand, spore's prob the most open in SE Asia on gender and sexuality, and they also seem pretty good on the environment and social/community issues.

Clubbing/music/arts, generally, is mileees better in spore than in malaysia (though neither are as good as in indonesia). food is okay, better than HK, but not as good as Msia.

i dunno, it's a weird little country. wouldn't go back to living there in a million years because christ, nothing exciting ever happens there, but it's an alright enough place to visit i guess.

spore's prob the most open in SE Asia on gender and sexuality

sure abt this?

apart from thailand yeah. not very open but better than most imo.

i know a lez from .sg who gives the impression u have to keep it v. much on the dl, is why i asked. pretty sure she was saying the state had a problem with it.

then again she did make a short with a gay relationship in it, think she had some state funding too. seems like i got it twisted somehow.

yeah in my experience, it's more of an repressive asian family/cultural thing, not really a state thing. also while you can't find porn easily in singapore, as far as discussions/portrayals in the media and sex ed in schools, they're way less uptight about it all than malaysians are.

i'm going here in three weeks to visit my dad. what can i do here?

Chew gum

what drugs should i bring?

also open to tips on what to do in thailand.

..... bump?

this is where my mom's from! but it's been Radically Transformed since her tenure so i can be of no help sorry. sometimes i argue w her about lee kwan yew like a good first amendment kid but she always half convinces me.

don't spit, is the only advice i can give.

william gibson wrote an article about singapore once called "disneyland with the death penalty" but, like, dude, bill, that's just disneyland.

lol

people say singapore is chicago to hong kong's new york

things to do in singapore: renounce your us citizenship and take advantage of singapore's super low tax rate

I spent four days in Singapore a few years ago and basically ended up eating a lot and going to the cinema several times. Nice respite from the craziness of the rest of SE Asia, but not very interesting after the first day.

In Thailand, I would recommend going to the lovely chilled out riverside town of Kanchanaburi.

try walking slowly and aimlessly, sometimes standing in place

haha

i will be doing that, i think.

See if you can find a beer in a restaurant or bar for under $10.

http://www.internationalsexguide.info/forum/forumdisplay.php?248-Singapore

"Money is the world's greatest aphrodisiac"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchard_Towers

The only country music bar in Singapore 'Country Jamboree' is located on the 2nd floor.

if you go to singapore and don't go to country jamboree, you might as well stay in union.

I'm headed to Singapore in a month - we have some friends there on a fullbright and I'll have just finished grad school so it seems like a nice time to go. They (and another friend who has traveled there a lot for business) say it's kind of boring but we're also going to go to Phuket and Bangkok for a couple days - these friends have lived in Bangkok on two separate occasions and will be our guides which will be kind of nice.

Anything worth checking out other than eating a lot? Art stuff, cheap foods, people watching, etc? I've never been anywhere outside the US except Italy so I'm super stoked but also kind of terrified.

i might be moving to singapore. anybody lived there before?

Is someone paying for you to do that? The rental market (which almost entirely targets ex-pats) is deeply awful right now, theoretically because of companies moving everyone from Hong Kong but also because there's nothing stopping people from raising rents by 75%.

Yes, my wife’s job, but I’ll have to leave my job to go. Tell me good places to live

Expats tend to cluster around Holland Village and Bukit Timah; they're livable, though it feels very much like a suburb, and a little boring, though maybe that's just how Singapore is. If you can live way out east, I like Joo Chiat and Kantong - they feel a bit more neighborhood-y.

thanks for the info!