May 04, 2008 01:34 PM
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We went to Singapore in October for a weeklong holiday. Booked our own tickets through JetStar Asia and got the hotel and day tours booked through the travel agent in Bangalore. We had five days at our disposal in Singapore. We had booked hotel Fragrance Seligie, which was a budge hotel, but I advice people not to stay there if the hotel room is of importance to you. The rooms are clean, but extremely small, there is only about 1-2 foot of space around the bed. The beds are also small and if your height is above 5.5 ft, your feet will definitely hang out of the bed. I must not even start talking about the toilet – it ends as soon as it starts – totally cramped. You cannot even take clothes inside the toilet, as they will get wet during the bath – you can well imagine. The only plus point is the location of the hotel – you can walk down to a lot of places like Little India, Sim Lim Square, Bugis Street, etc. from the hotel. Also, the rate was SGD 79 per night. Anyways, now let me move on to the places we visited.
Since we had a lot of time in our hands, we covered many tourist places including the following:
- Night Safari: Great to see all the nocturnal animals in action
- Singapore zoo: Well maintained and well kept animals
- Jurong bird park: Got a chance to have an eagle sit on my hand
- Merlion: Did not like the vomiting Merlion statue – highly overhyped. The esplanade theatre in the background was good though
- City and its buildings
- Clarke Quey: Had Singapore sling at one of the restaurants and went on a river cruise during the evening
- Gem stone factory: Some very good gemstone paintings were exhibited here
- Chinese temple: Great architecture
- Indian temple: Didn’t go inside – have seen too many in India already
- National orchid garden: Lovely flowers and trees
- Little India: Rajnikant posters and tamil music welcome you to little India. Mustafa market is not even half as good as some of the shopping malls we have in India today
- China town: Nice place for souvenir shopping from “3 for$10 shops”
- Sim Lim Square: A huge market for electronics – bought a camera for a friend
- Bugis Street: Bought a lot of t-shirts, watches, sun-glasses, belts and accessories from herea t good price
- Orchid Street: For shopping
- Santosa Island: This is where we enjoyed the most. Went to the island in the cable car and saw almost all the attractions there including: dolphin show, aquarium, museum, Carlsberg sky tower, luge ride(must-do), sky rail, 4D theater, water fountain show
- Metro train: We had a ride in the train too when we went to the China Town
Overall, I would say that the place is fully decked up for the tourists. If you are an Indian tourist visiting a foreign country for vacation for the first time, then Singapore is a perfect place. The people are friendly, it is easy to find directions, traveling is cheaper than other countries, and it has a lot of attractions for the entire family.
