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Not sure quite how to start this one as I have seen so much over the last two days! Started of yesterday by getting a taxi to Mount Faber - taxis are subsidised and very cheap - you are not expected to give a tip either so they are a great way to get around.
Mount Faber has a cable car that goes over one of the 6 huge harbours and takes you to Sentosa Island - made famous for the fact that pirates used to live there and then attack merchant ships.
Very touristy but good fun! Has the usual stuff life an aquarium, a tower lookout point and a museum on the history of Singapore - of course I went to as much as I could but had to stop for lunch followed by a bacardi mojito!
I then made my way to China Town and could not believe how amazing it was! Talk about an assault on the senses! The houses/shops are painted in every pastel shade you could think of, the smells and sounds come at you from every street! But, the highlight for me was the Hindu Temple. This is incredible, amongst all the bustle and noise there is a slice of serenity, taking my shoes of to enter into the near silence was actually just what I needed after a frantic morning trying to cram as much in as possible!
The carvings, frescos and statues had a qaulity that you dont seem to get in your bog standard c of e church back in the UK!! Colours, detail, facial expressions - everything was larger than life but there was this wonderful calm about the place and everyone who entered recognised this and acted accordingly.
Little India was different and yet had the some of the same kind of qualities, it was more run down and gritty, the population were obviously Indian asian and the smells were not overwhelmingly of curry (stereotyping I know!) but were more subtle and I could smell incense and spices. The buildings were still colourful and bright, but some of the streets were tatty and dirty - the first time I have seen anywhere in Singapore that is not immaculate! There were quite a few temples around, predominantly Mosques, they were well maintained and beautiful too!
I had spent the morning at Raffles Hotel - such a beautiful place - and decided to get to Little Indis using the undergound system, this was at the most extreme opposite end of of the scale in terms of what the London Underground is like!! It was spotlessly clean, efficient and high tech, would definitely recommend using this as a way of getting around, although ther are still extending it!
This is such a great place to come if you want to experience lots of different cultures living together, the underlying philosophy of Singapore is the Four Winds - consiting of Peace, Family, Community and Harmony, and somehow, from what I have expereinced anyway, this seems to work.
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