Quick stop in Singapore

market in Chinatown
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After an overnight flight from Brisbane and a stopover in Kuala Lumpur, Koren and I spent most of our first day in Singapore catching up on sleep. The next day, we got up bright and early to pack all the sights into one very long day. We started out in Chinatown, which was brightly decorated and in full Chinese New Year celebration. Because we went early, we managed to catch a packed street market on the inner alleys of Chinatown. The market was wall-to-wall people and sold everything from fabrics and New Year decorations, to nuts and dried fruits (dried lotus root was especially good). In Chinatown, we also managed to visit the oldest mosque in the city (Masjid Jamae), where we were given a quiet and reverent tour by one of the mosque attendants clearly concerned with teaching Westerners about his religion and dispelling some of the negative stereotypes that prevail in the West about Islam. Next door was one of the oldest Hindu temples in the city with a brightly coloured gompuram above the entrance (a pyramid with brightly coloured statues of all the Hindu gods that used to be the focus of worship for lower caste individuals who were not permitted in the temples). The contrast in style of worship and architecture was enormous. The mosque was very quiet and Islam forbids any graven images of God or his creation in a place of worship, while the Hindu temple was quite loud and colourful, with statues and various flowers or food strewn across the floor. We also visited a Daoist temple, which was another experience altogether. I was particularly amazed by the way that these religious and ethnic groups (Muslim Malays, Daoist or Buddhist Chinese, and Hindu Southern Indians) work, live, and worship alongside each other. The government consciously encourages this by imposing quotas on government housing (where most people live), so that each condo building is inhabited by the same proportion between the ethnic groups as live in Singapore at large. As a result, these groups seem even less segregated than they are in North America. Probably the highlight of our Chinatown trip was a trip to a traditional tea house, where we were shown how to perform a traditional tea ceremony. It was remarkable how much the fragrance of the 'fragrance cup' changes depending on whether t has tea in it, the tea has just been poured out, or the cup has cooled after having the tea poured out. In each case, the cup gives off a totally different fragrance and highlights different notes from the tea. From Chinatown, we walked to the historic central district of the city where the colonial administration was centred. We had an obligatory Singapore Sling at the Raffles hotel where it was invented, but I would say it is not really worth it because the drink costs 24 dollars!! and does not come with any fancy preparation. The hotel is a beautiful example of colonial architecture, though. Next, we walked to Little India for lunch. The streets are a feast for all the senses, with spice shops, sari and fabric stores, gold jewellers and restaurants. I got some henna done on my hand, and I'll post some pictures of that on my website a bit later. We rushed home from little India just in time to embark on the 'food walk' offered by the owner of our hostel. Tony speaks perfect English and is extremely knowledgeable on the subject of Singapore's history and culture. In addition to trying out local specialties like mee goreng, curry pastries, spring rolls wrapped in an omelette, rice balls, and traditional Chinese sweets, Tony told us all about the history of the area we were staying in. We learned, for instance, about the urine sensors in each elevator, which are designed to shut down the elevator and call the police when they sense that someone has peed in the elevator. Clearly, the Singapore government wields a fairly tight control over the population, but it's small size has enabled the country to come up with some creative solutions to social and environmental problems. Singaporeans must purchase a permit to own a car, which are distributed by auction and under a strict quota. As a result, it is extremely expensive to own and drive a car on the island, while public transportation is quite  cheap. Also, to prevent congestion, tolls along a congested roads fluctuate and rise when the road is busy, while those on alternative roads decrease. While some punishments in Singapore seem excessive and brutal (they still hang people), it seems as though the active government role has also done much good. It was particularly helpful to have a local like Tony to show us around and discuss things with, because we found out a lot about Singapore that we wouldn't have learned from the guidebooks. I was pleasantly surprised by the city because I expected it to be full of highrises and obsessively clean. Our tour of the ethnic districts showed quite a different side of the city.