Stunning Skyline and a Great Shopping Location

I am going to be brief about Darwin and Singapore because I only spent a day in each. First, Darwin.

Darwin is a territorial town but has a newish feel to it because a great deal of it was bombed in WWII and it was also hit by a devastating cyclone. However, it does have a few British Colonial buildings along the Esplanade on the ocean and I understand it has a city tour that takes you around to see the bungalows and grand houses in the historic parts of the city. It is a service city of hotels, restaurants and bars and is easy to get around. I primarily snooped around in the Aboriginal Art Galleries and had a superb lunch at a Thai fusion restaurant called Hanuman. I recommend it to anyone going to Darwin. I flew in and out of Darwin to see Kakadu which is why I spent a night there.

Singapore is another thing altogether. I only planned one day there but I am so sorry that I did not allow more time. It is a GREAT City/Country. It has a terrific skyline filled with very artistic, architecturally interesting buildings that range from disk/space ship-shaped towers, art deco office buildings, asian bungalows along the river, chinese temples, etc. It appears to have a height restriction over much of the city because when you fly in, everything looks uniform except right downtown where modern high rises prevail. I made the HUGE mistake of not taking my camera with me because I thought I was going to be shopping the entire time. What a SHAME!! SIngapore is filled with wonderful scenes everywhere you turn and the architecture is fantstic.

I took the Singapore International Airliens SIA Hop-On-It bus shuttle around town for $12/day. You can get on and off as much as you like with the entire loop taking about 2 hours. I never made it all of the way around. I had read about Chinatown and Little India and knew that I had to go to Orchard Street, THE SHOPPING LOCATON, so that is how I spent my seven hours. I started in Chinatown by going to Yue Hwa, a very large Chinese department store. It was fascinating and well worth a stop. I also went just down the street to 59 Mosque Street to a paper company that I read about where you could buy prayer/blessing joss papers. I got two packs plus red feng shui donation envelopes for $1.30!!! And the buildings in this area were really picturesque, bungalow style row houses with shutters in all sorts of colors and building ornamentaion that was beautiful.

My second stop was Orchard Street. This long street with high rise and underground malls needs at least three days to cover properly. You can find almost any high end retailer from the west there - Prada, Gucci, Chanel, Louis Vuitton, House of Condoms, Max Mara, Marks and Spencers, Levis. Gap, Jim Thompsom, Teuscher's. etc. To be honest, it was too much for me in one day, so I walked about half the street, did one underground mall, and only went into one store, Jim Thompsons (of Thai fabric fame).

For my final destination, I headed to Little India, an area of town that a security guard at the Darwin airport told me about because he was from SIngapore. And I felt at home again!! I was surrounded by women in saris, the smells were sensational, men were riding motorbikes and bicycles, the streets were narrow, Bollywood music filled the air, the goods were inexpensive and I could buy a diet coke for $.70 instead of the $5.50 I paid at lunch on Orchard Street at Marmalade Cafe (very good!!!). The security guard had told me about Mustafas, an Indian department store, so I walked about ten blocks to check it out. This was an experience!! Security guards at the entrance took your bags like a coat checker, and then you entered four or five floors of another world, packed with everything under the sun-electronics, food, Indian clothing, hardware items, appliances, house wares, linens, childrens clothes, you name it. And cheap! I used great restraint and only bought a few pillow covers. I then walked several blocks to Arab Street because I had read about some fabric stores there. On my way, I ran into a square block-wide flea market so snooped around there and bought some old chinese coins for future art pieces. My last stops were to the two fabric shops that I had read about. I ended up buying some Indian fabric and then headed back to my hotel. The day was full and the sights were wonderful. I highly recommend Singapore to anyone travelling in this area!!!

Sights=large ships along the harbour, very sharply dressed women cruising Orchard Street, Sun Microsystems building, wide-tree-lined streets and green city parks, a large carousel along the river, asian bungalows, brighly shuttered buildings in the ethnic parts of town, SIngapore's extensive Botanic Garden, young Asian girls holding hands with older western men as in Bangkok,  double-decker city buses, buskers playing chinese instruments, modern art sculptures in parks and on street islands, modern convention center, great architecture, tropical plants and trees, hugh baskets with small dried fish in every color and shape, traditional Chinese medicine shops, cafes and restaurants on sidewalks

Sounds=people talking in Malay, Chinese, Hindi, and English, bus and car engines, bartering at the flea market, Bollywood music

Tastes= hot green chicken curry with galangal and Thai basil, coconut rice with almonds, fresh fruit, gratinated tomatoes, Australian beer

Smells-Chinese and Indian spices, dried fish, salt air