Singapore Sep 21-22

Our body clocks were still on Melbourne time so we started off our day in Singapore at five in the morning but loafed around in luxury and had a late breakfast.  Even so, it was still comparatively cool (for Singapore) when we set out for our visit to the National Museum of History.  It’s housed in the lovely building you can see at right, but has been recently renovated.  We enjoyed ourselves, but in my opinion they have overdone the hi-tech at the expense of providing the visitor with any useful information. 

The visit begins with a long and utterly pointless tramp down a long pathway to the bowels of the building.  It probably symbolises going back into the past, but for small children, the elderly or inform, it doesn’t offer anything except a long walk.  There’s nothing to look at en route, and the welcome on the obligatory audio gadget was just annoying.  Even more annoying is that when you get to the galleries there are no print explanations about the exhibits, only the audio which is slow and not particularly informative.  For each gallery there is a dumbed down introduction, and then for each numbered item in a cabinet there’s more information if you program in the item number – but it’s a slow and tedious way to find out anything.  Unless you’re prepared to stand there and load up each segment for each item you miss a lot, and there aren’t any serendipitous discoveries, which is one of the things I really like about museums.   We came out not knowing much more about Singapore’s history than we did at the beginning (That is that it began as a trading centre, then became a British colony, followed by Japanese occupation, squabbles with Malaysia and Independence.)  We much preferred the Asian Civilizations Museum which we visited last time.

 However, quite by accident, we then stumbled into one of Singapore’s best Chinese restaurants. We’d worn ourselves out by the time we’d walked to and around the museum and it was time for a late lunch – but the most prominent of the museum’s restaurants offered disappointingly European fare. Tucked away behind the obvious places is Chef Chan’s Restaurant, and it was here that we had the best Chinese food we’ve ever had. (And that includes a meal at the Flower Drum in Melbourne.)

 We couldn’t resist menu D, which offered the steamed sliced frog with red date and black fungus and ginger onion. It was a fascinating dish (though tricky to eat with chopsticks) but it was the sauteed beef with snow peas, celery and black pepper sauce which really impressed. Perfectly cooked, and perfectly balanced in terms of texture and taste.  A truly memorable meal.

Our next stop was the Singapore Art Museum, housed in what used to be a massive boys’ school run by the De La Salle Brothers.  It’s a young gallery so the focus is on contemporary artists and were most impressed by the exhibit of Cheong Soo Pieng’s works.  He’s an extraordinarily versatile artist and his work is influenced by his travels throughout SE Asia.

Back at Raffles to collect our bags we had a cocktail at the famed Writers’ Bar to while away the hours before our flight.  The bar is a salute to writers who have stayed at or written about the hotel, my favourites being Joseph Conrad,  Somerset Maugham George Bernard Shaw.  It was in honour of these writers that on my first visit in 2005 I had bought a little souvenir key chain, and – having mislaid it, I was disappointed to find that I could not buy a replacement because they were no longer making them.  

When we were checking out and were asked  if everything was satisfactory (how could it not be?!) I mentioned this disappointment as a joke.  No problem, said the manager, and vanished off to the shop despite my protestations.  He was back before long and produced one of these lovely key chains as a complimentary gift.  It was the second-last one they had and it’s a collector’s item because they’re re-designing them.   I’m going to take very good care of this one!

It was all downhill from there.  Changi airport has all manner or luxury goods for sale but the food hall for dinner between check-in and departure is very ordinary and we ended up picking at some rather dull sushi in a far corner of the airport.  It was a very long day before we finally boarded our 11.05 flight to London…

10 Things I Learned About Singapore

1. Singapore defines itself as a ‘young’ country. According to our tour guide, its history starts with its independence and its colonial past survives only in the historic buildings. For Australians, this is a bit confronting, because The Fall of Singapore to the Japanese in WW2 is one of the defining moments of our history.
2. On the other hand, they celebrate Raffles as a man who saw the potential of the place as the crossroads of Asia. The plaque on his statue reads ‘On this historic site Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles first landed in Singapore on 28th January 1819 and with genius and perception changed the destiny of Singapore from an obscure fishing village to a great seaport and modern metropolis.’
3. It’s an interesting mix of fiercely competitive private enterprise and government intervention. Their economy is based on tourism, finance, trade, biotechnology and education, and it’s a city of merchants, with a tax rate of 2.5%. The government, however, pays women to have babies and offers a $S30 000 subsidy to couples buying a home of their own if they take their parents with them. It also spends a good deal of money painting and upgrading public housing so that it always looks nice and doesn’t detract from the shining clean and modern image that Singapore presents to the world.
4. In a curious deference to world opinion, their Year 12 exams are examined in Cambridge. The rationale is that this gives the qualifications credibility and acceptance all over the world, which they might not otherwise have.
5. Their national language is English, not an Asian language, though children must learn other languages at school. Very pragmatic.
6. Grace Kelly stayed at Raffles.
7. The old Supreme Court Building has a dome like St Paul’s Cathedral. The new Supreme Court Building looks like a space dish.
8. Singapore never stops rebuilding itself. There are always cranes on the horizon.
9. Everyone seems to take great pride in what they do. People with the most menial of jobs – cleaning a glass shelf, for instance – could be seen doing their work carefully and with attention to detail. No surly taxi drivers, no cranky shop assistants or waiters. Their airline service is fantastic. It’s very pleasant, and it’s not just in expensive hotels and restaurants.
10. There are more museums and an art gallery to visit on our next stopover!