the bizarrely placed city state full of malls (ugh) and potable tap water (ahh!)

The obligatory Merlion photo.
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Well we made it out of the Philippines and feel like we are finally starting this trip now, for real, for about the 5th time.  Now we are on our own.  We are no longer just visiting a friend, which means no more personal tour guide who knows the language, or can tell us where to go or what to eat.  It's up to us now, and it is terrifying.

It seems that Singapore was a good place to start.  It is very clean, there is a ton to do, everyone speaks English, and there is as much water as we can drink.  We stayed at an adorable hostel near Little India, which we explored every night.  It turns out that we are right in the middle of Deepavali, a big Indian festival of lights, and also Hari Raya Puasa, the end of Ramadan, so we have been eating a ton of delicious treats and enjoying more than our share of impromptu street performances.

Bizarre Haw Par Villa.
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Interestingly enough, all of the different neighborhoods here (Chinatown, Little India, Orchard st., Raffles-ville) are all made up entirely of MALLS!!  They are malls with different themes, to be sure, but we could literally walk one block above ground and one block indoors across the entire island.  Not that we're complaining- we'll take any air con break we can get at this point.

In our 2 days (3 nights) here, we did many of the things we thought people would ask about.  We went to Raffles, and had a Singapore sling while throwing peanut shells on the floor.  We saw a light show at the Fountain of Wealth (the largest fountain in the world).  We eventually got to Haw Par Villa, and in the process learned that tourist maps are not always drawn to scale.  We saw the giant Merlion spitting into the river.  Then we left, because this is an expensive place, with silly things to do.