8 Things to Do in
Roaring Singapore
By Michael David C. Tan
IMAGES COURTESY OF SINGAPORE TOURISM BOARD

“Great Singapore Sale (GSS) is a hoax!” an angry man, who describes himself as a “man of the world, who has had the chance to shop everywhere, from the classy cities of Europe to the alley markets of Africa,” tells the radio disc jockey (DJ) as soon as she answered one of the radio station’s busily ringing phones.   His somewhat shrilly voice filled our otherwise quiet taxi cab, as it plied the green route from Singapore’s Changi Airport to Coleman Street in downtown Singapore.  “The (vendors) mark up their prices before the GSS, and then just sell them on their original prices again when the GSS comes.”

FILLED WITH FUN For a place so small, Singapore has a lot to offer, including the night safari (second photograph fromtop), and its yummy delicacies.

The DJ earlier asked her listeners to comment on how great the GSS really is, and, thus far, she was not getting any positive comments.  “So you think they are deceiving us with the GSS selling point of being a great sale?” she asks, though she sounded like she already made up her mind, too.

“Exactly,” he says, just before his phone line was disconnected, though only to be followed by more phone calls with reactions to the GSS in the same vein as his.  True, occasionally, there were callers saying that the GSS is proving good to the economy, but generally, locals, at least, find nothing so great about the GSS.

Fortunately, and not just for Singapore, but especially to those visiting the city/state, there is more – much, much more, actually – to the place than GSS.

1. Shop ‘til you drop – and this is not just a cliché.
Well, even sans the GSS, Singapore is a shopping paradise.  After all, it is not called the “ultimate indulgence in retail therapy” for nothing, with such offerings as “fashion apparel, accessories, jewellery, watches, electronic goods, cosmetics and fragrances, children toys, and Singapore souvenirs, (so that) every visitor will be spoilt for choice with numerous special offers, discounted prices and exclusive promotions,” as the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) puts it. Major stores and malls are on Orchard Road, Marina Bay, and Bugis Street, where the biggest annual sales, and where STB’s privileges, “specially created for tourists during the sale period to enjoy the range of exclusive lifestyle promotions, including gourmet dining, wellness experience, and nightlife and entertainment options” are usually concentrated (the Singaporean government is really pushing for this, even providing the Tourist Privilege Card, which comes together with the free tourist guide).  But shopping – at least for me – is more exciting when done in the suburbs, such as Little India and Chinatown, where oddities abound (and not necessarily cheaply, mind you) as much as those offered by the more mainstream stores/outlets.

2. Go natural.
For a country that only has over 700 square kilometers of land area (no bigger than Metro Manila, Singapore is actually made up of not just one island, but a 682 square kilometer main island with 63 surrounding islets), Singapore has, among others, over 200 real working farms in six Agrotechnology Parks that occupy a total land area of 1,500 hectares; the Chek Jawa, , Chek Jawa is a collection of six distinct habitats - coastal forest, mangroves, sand bars, seagrass lagoon, rocky shore, and coral rubble located at the eastern tip of Pulau Ubin; the Mandai Orchid Garden, which houses some of the world’s rarest hybrids; numerous parks (including the picturesque Labrador, historic Fort Canning, and shopping haven Marina City); and the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve, an 87-hectare conserved wetland habitat that is home to over 500 species of tropical flora and fauna.
So definitely, when the city’s hustle and bustle gets to you in Singapore, as it inevitably will, going back to nature is, indeed, more than possible.

3. Experience cultures.
Singapore can claim to be one of the cultural melting pots in this part of the world – they have Little India (for Indians, of course), Chinatown, and Geylang Serai and Kampong Glam (for the Malay community in Singapore) to prove this. But more than the overwhelming scents of peculiar looking, and tasting, delicacies in the streets of Little India, or the cheap shopping long associated with everything Chinese in Chinatown, Singapore’s somewhat ghetto-ized communities show that as far as cultures are concerned, keeping traditions may be ideal for their preservation, but blending them does not only increase awareness of them, but even helps in their growth.

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