Asian Trip 2018 – Singapore

Our Malaysia Airlines flight from KLIA to Singapore was on-time and uneventful. While the 737 had a very new interior, the seat pitch was really tight. I’m not often grateful that I’m short; but on this flight, I was glad my legs weren’t supermodel-length or my knees would have been bruised being smashed up against the seat in front of me. The flight attendants were pleasant though and they managed to provide a small snack during the roughly hour-long flight.

We landed at Changi, where we first started our Asian odyssey. We knew now how to navigate around and quickly were in the queue for Singapore immigration. And while standing in line, I was serenaded by an extraordinarily friendly airport worker who was tasked with trying to ensure people had their forms filled in before getting to the immigration officer. It was a delightful, quirky surprise and made the time way more enjoyable than I have ever experienced waiting in line. 

Receiving my second Singapore passport stamp, I grabbed our suitcases and once the hubster cleared immigration, we made our way to the taxi queue. Although I had the directions for taking the train, the hubby decided that we should just pretend that we’re not poor backpackers and take a taxi like normal adults do. That usually goes against my frugal traveling nature; but I acquiesced without a fuss. Sometimes you gotta pick your battles, right? In the cab on the way to the hotel, we were both amused when the radio started playing Color Me Badd’s 90s hit All For Love. I couldn’t resist dancing in the back seat and mouthing the words, no doubt entertaining the older Singaporean up front. My husband, used to my random and usually situationally inappropriate dancing and lipsynching, just rolled his eyes and looked out the window in an attempt to distance himself from my antics.  

(I just watched the video on YouTube and forgot how awesomely 90s-tastic that video is. Seriously, they’re dancing around in someone’s foyer for half the video, the hot guy wearing the white pants who’s not the lead singer gets way more screen time – deservedly so, damn he’s cute in a Wham-era George Michael kinda way – and it appears that Kenny G might have been part of the line-up. Man, I sound like an old lady but music nowadays is not nearly as much fun as it used to be.)

Ok, I need to rant for a minute. I have Platinum Status with a global hotel chain. As part of my benefits, I’m supposed to be upgraded automatically to the best available room. Unfortunately, that rarely happens without me having to call the front desk after getting into my room and saying, “Really, this is the best room you could have put me in?” So when I checked in at the JW Marriott, I specifically asked even before accepting the room key. The check-in guy shrugged and told me I would need to call the front desk after I went upstairs if I wanted to change. And the second I opened the door of the room on the third floor and saw the unlovely view of a very busy road, I was right on the phone telling the front desk that I needed to be moved into the room category that I actually booked, which was a marina-facing room on a high floor. Yes, not only did I not get an upgraded suite, I didn’t even get the room category that I paid for. Had I not pre-paid for the room, I would have walked out and gone down the street to the Mandarin Oriental, where I most assuredly would have gotten a better room than the one the current hotel was trying to put me. To make matters worse, I was told that I would need to pay to upgrade back into the room category that I had booked! I was livid and said, “I have to pay to get into the room type that I prepaid for and wait, I have to pay as a Platinum member when I’m supposed to be upgraded for free anyway?” Readers, I hate doing that. It makes me uncomfortable and irritated beyond belief to have to fight for a benefit I’m supposed to be receiving as a reward for my expensive loyalty to that chain. After waiting for over a half hour for the front desk to figure things out, we finally got someone to bring up a room key for the room they should have given me in the first place. So the upshot is that the happy mood I had in the cab evaporated quickly into a crabby and irritated one. Needless to say, this experience combined with others means that I’m no longer loyal to that chain and won’t be chasing status with them since it appears to count for nothing.

Ok, rant over… Not really… I went to the executive lounge to check out the happy hour while the hubby took a shower and freshened up before we decided on dinner. The lounge was absolutely packed to the rafters and empty food trays sat out for the entire 30 minutes I sat there. Not that the employees weren’t trying to keep up but it felt like the entire population of every hotel in walking distance crashed that lounge and descended like locusts every time food was brought out. The only saving grace was that the bar was self-service so I poured a very generous amount of vodka into the only clean glassware available (a red wine glass so undoubtedly I poured more than the standard shot) and grabbed a lemon-lime soda to mix and tried to figure out where to go for dinner.

Mercifully, the hubby came down within an hour and we departed the hotel on a quest to find the somewhat hidden rooftop bar I read about online.  Surprisingly, we found it without a single wrong turn and we were soon ensconced on the third-floor rooftop of a nondescript building looking at the skyline of the neighboring buildings. We ordered drinks with tropical ingredients and devoured a basket of waffle fries sauced with a sweet honey soy sauce, sesame seeds and green onions. They were delicious. It didn’t quite pull me out of the mood I was in, but it went a long way. After, we walked a mile or so down the road to check out the Singapore Flyer, the huge Ferris wheel on the edge of the marina area. Because it was after-hours, the area was deserted except for a few couples strolling the waterside boardwalk. We walked along for a bit, trying unsuccessfully to get photos of the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and the Gardens By the Bay. Finally, we turned back towards our hotel, stopping in a few of the nicer-looking watering holes along the way before finally returning to our room well after midnight.

The next day, we opted to forgo the executive lounge breakfast to start our explorations before the forecasted afternoon thunderstorms arrived. We made a loop – visiting the War Memorial Park, strolling past the Esplanade Theaters, across the pedestrian bridge to check out the Merlion Statue/Fountain and sticking to the waterfront path that led past the Fullerton Hotel (which looks very snazzy and if I were at all sophisticated, I would stay there), rounding the corner to the Promontory (BTW, whoever thought up the the shade fan trees is a genius), and eventually making our way to the Marina Bay Sands Mall. We ducked in to grab a late lunch and after eating, went right back outside. The hectic shopping frenzy in the mall made my skin itch and while I appreciated the air-conditioning, I just didn’t want to be wandering a mall when there was so much to see outside. I took a bunch of photos of the ArtScience Museum, which is shaped like a lotus flower.

We then walked across the Helix pedestrian bridge that provided some stunning views of downtown and eventually found ourselves back where we started. Since it hadn’t started raining yet, we opt to walk along the Singapore River path. We covered miles in the tropical heat and humidity so when it did actually start raining, I was secretly relieved to start the trek back to the hotel, somehow entering the subterranean labyrinth that connects the subway stations and ubiquitous shopping centers. I was pretty proud of myself for seamlessly navigating our way underground right back to the hotel’s doorstep. That night, we walked a few blocks to a blocked-off street that offered every type of Asian cuisine available. My husband got it into his head that he wanted ramen and even though it is totally not Singaporean in the slightest, we found a Japanese restaurant in the midst of Thai, Cambodian, and every imaginable variation of Chinese food. 

The next day we had plans to go to the Gardens By the Bay, but Mother Nature had other ideas. It was absolutely pouring for most of the day. Somehow, we ended up on Orchard Road where the proliferation of shopping malls is overwhelming. But at least we were kept mostly dry while we checked out the basement food stalls. While we were in a hidden cocktail bar, the rain finally eased so we could check out the Christmas decorations lining Orchard Road. Apparently someone made a long-term deal with Disney and we found the juxtaposition of decor promoting the movie Frozen in a nation that is pretty much smack on the Equator a bit hilarious. It was getting late at that point, and my hubby decided that instead of the hawker center he picked for dinner, we would instead stop in the one we were passing on our way back to the hotel. The variety was incredible and I had a hard time making up my mind. I ended up with some fish thing that was delicious, even though I’m still not exactly sure what it was. 

To cap off our final night in Singapore, and our final night of the trip, we stopped in at the Raffles Hotel Long Bar for a Singapore Sling. Even though the hotel itself is current under construction, the bar is open for business. So we took bar stools, cracked open some peanuts, threw the shells on the floor, and watched the bartender manning the wonderfully steam-punk-styled contraption that shakes multiple shakers of Singapore Slings at one time. The drinks are horrifically expensive and I nearly fell off my bar stool when my hubby ordered a second round, but what the heck, how many times would we be fortunate to be in Singapore drinking Singapore Slings at the bar that invented the damn thing? So I ignored the mental voice that was crying over spending $100 for four cocktails and relished that I had finally gotten to the other side of the planet.

And then, just like that, our sojourn in Asia was over. The next morning, we had to get up at an ungodly hour to shower, pack, and make our way to Changi airport for our flight that would take us all the way back to San Francisco and then home to Austin. In the early morning quiet, I sat in the taxi on the way to the airport and thought about how lucky I am to be able to have experienced three amazing countries.