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Since I now had two days in Singapore, I got to create a new plan for what I was going to do there. After checking into my hostel, showering and changing into lighter clothes, I took the MRT to the Harborfront where I went to hike up Mt. Faber before sunset. Mt. Faber is the tallest “mountain” in Singapore. At 344 feet, it is quite a monster.  There is a nice forested path that goes up to the top, where there is a lookout that gives you a pretty good view of a number of areas in the city. At that time of day, there were a ton of people there with the same idea as me.

Lots of Cranes

After the hike down, I headed East to a seafood center where I got some of the famous Chili Crab. The crabs are imported from Sri Lanka and then cooked in a delicious spicy chili sauce. Last time I was in Singapore, I ended up getting pepper crab, which is supposed to be spicier, but isn’t as saucy.  At that point, I was pretty tired, and headed to sleep.

Chili Crab

Despite a huge time difference, I slept reasonably well, waking up once, and then going to back to sleep to wake up at 8am.  I ate a breakfast of roti prata and teh tarik and then did a long walk around Little India, checking out some temples along the way.  Once I had worked up a hunger again, I headed to the Katong district where I got some Otah (ground fish wrapped in banana leaves) and delicious Laksa. Though I will say that the homemade Laksa from my buddy Jeremy tasted better in my mind.

Course at Night

One thing that was hard to miss in Singapore right now is the prevalence of signs advertising the Singapore F1 Grand Prix. The race happens September 24-26 and is famous for being the only night course on the circuit.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t going to be there for any part of the race, which was a real bummer, but I did happen to stumble upon the course while exploring some of the areas around Marina Bay. In addition to seeing the course, I actually got to walk around on it and saw some workers still preparing the course. I also got to get up close with the red and white turn bumps; those things are seriously stiff. With basically no suspension, the drivers have to really get jolted around when they hit them going as fast as they do.  Walking around on part of the track really gave me a sense of how narrow the course is, and how tight the turns are. I’ve got a lot more respect for the drivers now (not to say I didn’t before).  It has got to be something to be able to see them race in person. Maybe another time I’ll be able to check out a race.

Last Monday morning, I left San Francisco at 1am local time, for the start of a month long trip to Singapore, Bali and Bangkok, with Singapore and Bangkok both being stop-overs in my itinerary. My flight originally stopped in Singapore on the way to Bali, and, seeing how I’m a huge fan of Singapore and all the food there, I got the reservations agent to extend the stay.

Above the SF Clouds

I took Singapore Airlines flight 1 from SFO to Hong Kong to Singapore. Even though this time I wasn’t in business class on Singapore Airlines, I was still completely comfortable and slept almost 8 hours on the flight. Definitely my favorite airline ever.

Chicken Rice

I arrived in Singapore at 11:30am on Tuesday and left at 5pm on Wednesday, making my stay a somewhat short 29 hours. Enough time to eat at least 6 meals, with plenty of room for ice cream and snow ice snacks along the way. After clearing immigration extremely fast, I hopped on the MRT a measly 30 minutes after landing, at noon, to head to Chinatown where I ate my first dish at the Maxwell Food Center: Chicken Rice at Tian Tian.  That place is bomb. I’ll eat there any day for any meal.

Strawberry Singaporean Snow Ice

After lunch, I searched around for a place recommended to me by my friends Wade and Marcy. They recommended a shop that sold “snow ice.” Snow ice is a big pile of flavored ice shavings, though it isn’t the kind of shavings that most people are used to. It’s the most fluffy, light and really flavorful ice shavings ever. I’ve no idea how they do it; I’m assuming magic, and I’ll stick to that story.

At this point, I was severely regretting my decision to wear pants and shoes on the plane. Between the pants, shoes and my big backpack on my back, I was horribly overheating and so immediately went to Little India in search of a place to stay. On the (thankfully) airconditioned train, I started looking at my calendar to figure out what time exactly my flight was the next day. To double-check, I pulled up my itinerary and saw that it said my flight was on the 23rd. But my calendar said that tomorrow was the 22nd. After 2 or 3 more checks, I realized that the damn international date line and time zone changes totally screwed with my ability to insert the flight into my single time-zone supported Google Calendar (come on Google, add multiple time zone support back in!!). So now, I had a full extra night in Singapore. At first I was bummed because I got to Bali later, but then, I was happy because there was so much more food to try in Singapore!

After getting to Little India and walking around getting prices from almost every place to stay there, sweating profusely, I settled on a backpackers hostel for $20 SGD (about $15 USD) per night. I showered, put on shorts, sandals and a much lighter shirt and began my tour of the city.