Singapore-Futuristic City

Singapore is a fantastic place. The ship docked at the terminal across from Sentosa Island. The Sentosa Project is nearly finished. It is a large casino and amusement park with beaches on the south-facing side. We visited the new ION Center and then the Takashimaya Department Store located in Ann Ngee Plaza on Orchard Road. These shopping complexes are beautiful, clean and ultra modern. We then waited for the Orange On-Off Bus which offers 4 slightly different routes through town, for one price, and one ticket is good for 2 days. You can pickup the bus on Orchard Road just east of the Tourist Information Booth. The price was 19 Singapore dollars each and Eiko couldn’t resist this bargain, because this bus can serve as your taxi. Singapore is a confusing city because there are no mountainous landmarks, other than Mt Faber’s cable cars….only the winding Singapore River and the giant skyscrapers. There are many hills covered with beautiful trees. But they block your vision of landmarks from street level. It is spread out, hot with frequent downpours and this makes an entire day, outside, on foot, difficult. The first day we ate lunch at a Japanese noodle place in the shopping center. The second day we brought sandwiches and ate on board the buses. Singapore is crowded (but not so crowded as Hong Kong) with immense complexes of enormous buildings. There is tremendous activity here and I can think only of Miami as a US city with so much building. Europe seems somnolent compared to this. The shopping experience is high-end although we didn’t have time to explore much. European fashion brands dominate these shopping centers. There are a couple of museums that probably merit some time. We have been to the Botanical Gardens but there is also a Bird Park that might be fun. I would have enjoyed exploring the new shopping center at the Sands Resort but there wasn’t time. We were able to avoid most of the rain and the ship pulled out of port about 7 pm, headed for Port Kelang, the port for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. All the pictures were taken in Singapore.