Singapore Scenery

I finally have some time to sit and tell you about Singapore in general! OK so to get this out of the way: it's hot. Like, very hot. Sticky, unforgivable, unrelenting, palpable, and at times excruciating. I mean, I just need to get over it - we are a mere 1 degree latitude above the equator, so what did we expect?

Besides that, Singapore is in every other way also the opposite of New York. There is no mixed use (save for a few exceptions, one of which is noted later), the subway stations are kilometers apart, they drive on the wrong side of the road, they until recently had bulldozed any building older than 30 years to make way for new high rises, there is jungle everywhere, (and snakes!) And even though this place us dense on paper, it certainly has a suburban feel. The Los Angeles of the east!

That said, we are liking it more and more every day here. The food is a major reason but surprisingly not the only one!

Food Is Good. Long live food. 

Singapore is known for its good food, especially Indian, Chinese, and Malay. This is a typical lunch for me - Nasi Goreng and Roti. Blending the best of both worlds.

There is a food court across from our serviced apartment called "Food Republic." Food Republic is quintessentially Singaporean -

1. It is a food court that only exists in malls. 
2. They actually serve local food
3. The food is delicious, plentiful, and varied
4. It is a clean, efficient, and cheap version of street food. 

They should be proud of Food Republic. 

On this particular day I decided to get Indonesian - curry chicken, eggplant in some sort of delicious sauce, and rice. To top it off I got local coffee called Kopi. Kopi is their local version of coffee. Imagine Thai iced coffee then make it stronger and sweeter, if you can imagine that. I love the stuff but sometimes cannot actually swallow it - my body rejects the syrupy goodness. On this day, it was perfect. 

Another Singaporean quality is their western aspirations for wealth, culture, and even sometimes, food. A city cannot even pretend to be western without good pizza. This hipster cafe called PS Cafe serves the best pizza around in a decidedly New York environment. We got two fantastic pizzas - all day breakfast and marinara. 

The inside of the place is straight out of downtown NY. Maybe even a little east village. It was a cool joint with a concept "twist" where everything is takeaway but you can find a seat in the restaurant and eat there. I found it weird but whatever. The space is totally cool, and is located in the only truly hipster neighborhood in Singapore - Tiong Bahru. 

Here you can tell when a place caters to WP (white people, which really just means European/US/Aussie foreigners) when their primary offering is booze. This place had no shortage of it. 

Speaking of WP, sometimes you are just in the mood for WP food! Singapore has a wealth of good western food as well, and sometimes we indulge. This Belgian place featured cheese balls and moules frites. We couldn't resist, and capped it off with Hoegaarden. 

And sometimes their food is just weird. Hot sandwiches from a vending machine, for example.

Singapore Sights

Singapore is a young place with an evolving skyline. They do a decent job at controlling development and encouraging growth where they want it. My problem with their model is that they don't encourage density or mixed use - a result of what I think is a cultural interpretation of what is "fancy" and western. It is virtually impossible to find a place where you can live and has access to a cafe, mall, or even a Watsons (basically a CVS) without paying an arm and a leg. Luckily, as New Yorkers, we are prepared to spend an arm and a leg! There are a couple of forces working in our favor right now.1 - Condo supply is out of control so there is a lot of choice on the market. 2 - The surplus of supply means ALL PRICES ARE NEGOTIABLE. Basically you can name your price and it can be 10-20% below asking. w00t.

Modern skyscrapers are the name of the game here. A building from 2010 is considered "old" here - that's how much construction is going on, as seen from our serviced apartment view. The construction in the foreground may be the new MRT (subway) line they are constructing, based on the size of the pit.

We have looked at probably 20+ apartments by now and many of them are very similar. For our price range, though, we rarely get good views. There were a couple of exceptions, though! The buildings seem to stretch on for miles and vary marginally between a few styles - tropical brutalist concrete (foreground), mid-90s/2000s painted concrete (dead center), and modern glass/steel gargantuans (toward the left and in the photo above). My favorites are the former because they remind me of our true home in Asia - Hong Kong.

We seriously considered this place almost entirely because of the view, but it was just too secluded. As I eluded to earlier, these buildings are ALL single use - residential. There is significant distance between them despite how close they appear in the photos, so the result is high density of people with low density of "stuff."

Note that Singapore is typically extremely sunny and blue-skied. This haze is from the annual burnoff that Indonesia does to control their forest or whatever. Every year it's major headlines in the local Straights Times.

These yellow/white ones on the left REALLY remind me of Hong Kong. It's a trick though, because nowhere here actually feels like HK on the ground :(. Singapore buildings waste no space where they can put a pool. Look closely at the roof wedge of the building in the foreground for a prime example.

Singapore is a VERY small place with not much room for expansion. They treasure every inch and put it to use, whether it is purposeful tree-lined boulevards, public parks/spaces, or recreation areas. Sentosa Island is Singapore's designated "activities island." There is a Universal Studios, outdoor activities like hiking and biking (and Segway tours!), and various resorts and marina clubs. We ventured out there for dinner one night and it is very pretty. The housing stock out here is almost exclusively for WP, but it is not a place we would want to live necessarily. There are tons of new condos overlooking the water, yacht clubs for leisure sailing, and tons of western restaurants (this is where we had cheese balls at the Belgian restaurant). 

This was a fun sign, pointing to all the destinations WP would find fabulous.   

The marina was particularly pretty at night. I didn't get any more pictures but will upload them when I do. 

When I say Singapore controls its growth, I mean it. The "downtown core" as it is called is exclusively office buildings. The skyline is kinda cool and is evolving slowly toward the southwest. Again, these buildings are all pretty far from each other thanks to the boulevards separating them, but it looks pretty cool.  Until recently there were no residences here at all, but with the expansion they have started adding a couple - notably the Sail, which we looked in, but could basically not afford. We also didn't want to live here because there is not a lot going on (think FiDi in NYC). The building in the foreground is their parliament. God Save the Parliament because they declared tomorrow a holiday (polling day) and we will be using the long weekend to holiday in Bangkok!

Here is an example of the downtown core expansion. This development is so large it inspires images of "globalization dystopia." 

A charming example of where Singapore has preserved some history is the Chinatown area. The "heritage buildings," while not all explicitly old, are in the style of the old neighborhood that used to give life to the center of Singapore. Chinatown is largely for tourists, but the areas immediately around it are cherished and frequented by WP ex-pats, ourselves included. These streets have tremendous character, local restaurants, haute cuisine, and bars/clubs (including the gay area!). Recently, developers have realized that WP enjoy this mixed use area, so they have been renovating the old loft spaces! We saw one on this street and fell in love with it. It was too small, so maybe it will do as our next place. 

The loft we looked at was on the building on the left here - 3rd floor.

Here she is. What a cool space! 'Twas not to be, though. 

 Really cool old style windows to the street. Note the cute hearts carved in the base. 

 Ugh. 

We are in the throes of negotiation now for places to live. While we likely won't end up in the loft, we could end up in something like this, which, really ain't too shabby.

With each passing day, Singapore feels more and more like home. We are excited to get settled and officially start our next chapter!