We can start the day with a visit to the Singapore Art Museum(SAM), then cross the street behind the Singapore Management University is the National Museum, if you still have time, walk to the left, cross the Fort Canning tunnel and end the day with a visit to the Peranakan Museum.

To get to the Singapore Art Museum, take the MRT, make your way to the Circle Line(Yellow) and alight at the Bras Basah MRT station. Follow the signs to the exit nearest Singapore Art Museum. The National Museum is just across SAM. Just cross the street and your there. Do make sure to be early as you will need a lot of time to fully absorb the interactive sights and sounds experience on the history of Singapore at the National Museum. Both Museums have a open/free to all schedule but these are after 5pm on a specific day or on International Museum Day and other events, check out their websites for more information. If you still have time after that, head towards your right and cross the Fort Canning Tunnel, a couple of meters and you will be at the Peranakan Museum. After that, you can head towards the SMRT Headquarters and across that will be Raffles City and the City Hall MRT station below.

Also on this area is the St. Joseph’s Cathedral and across that is Chijmes. These are beside SAM. Across Raffles City is St. Andrews, City Hall and the Padang. If you want a good view of the City, you can also go exit from the back of the National Museum or take the escalator on the outside left of the building towards Fort Canning Park, this fort also has much history and a good walking experience, I’d say a late afternoon to early night would be a good time to visit. The Battle Box on Fort Canning is also a good adventure, the World War 2 headquarters of for the defence of Singapore, a networked underground structure used by the British and Malayan forces.

The next day, you can head on to the Peranakan Museum and a couple of meters on it’s left side is the National Archives and the Singapore Philatelic Museum. A good couple of hours can be wasted on those two. After which, head on down towards the Fire Station to their Civil Defence Heritag Gallery inside the Central Fire Station. You can then head on down towards the river and Clarke Quay, follow it down stream passing by the Parliament, Boat Quay and then Asian Civilizations Museum. Also on this site is the landing site of Sir Stamford Raffles and Cavenagh Bridge. Across the bridge is the Fullerton Hotel and on the mouth of the river is the Merlion and Esplanade. The Asian Civilizations will take half a day to digest and on your way home, you can pass through the back towards City Hall and the Padang, which are sights to behold themselves and take the train on the City Hall MRT station.

I’m feeling happy and well due to a couple of really good reasons and news. First, my parents came for a visit, second, Brazil won on their first World Cup game against North Korea, third, I was able to procure at a very good and bargain price a good laptop during the PC show last weekend, and fourth, Apple has released the iPhone 4 and the other day the new mac mini(although a bit pricier).

While bringing around my parents, I was able to come up with a good walking tour full packed and meaningfull for first time visitors. All are walking or distance from each other or at the very least lest than 2km in radius so a cab would cost no more than 5 bucks and a bus no more 69 cents.

Old and New Experience

The first walking tour would start from the Tanjong Pagar MRT station, take the exit towards Amoy Street or Telok Ayer Park and walk a couple of meters towards the Amoy Food Centre. I recommend my favorite Beef Hor Fun from the Good Day shop or the Thai foods from the shop just across the Good Day shop. Grab a Kopi-C, Teh-C, Teh Halia or sugar cane juice from the shop beside Good Day to wash the food down and that should be a good fill for your tour. Getting a seat at between 12 to 1 could be a challenge and sharing tables is common. Be mindfull of reserved seats or tables which you can usually identify if it has a news paper or commonly tissue pack, although an umbrella, bag or any other personall items are sometimes used.

On the side of the Food Centre is Ann Sian Hill which would lead to Club Street and on the other side towards the MRT station is Maxwell Road, this will be next direction. head down towards the MND building, stay on the opposite side of the Road from the Red Dot Museum. I haven’t been inside that Museum but if you feel like it, you can cross the street at the front of MND building. After that, or if  your skipping it, go to the URA building just beside MND. Inside on the first 2 or 3 floors is a city exhibit of planned developments for Singapore, full with multimedia presentations and scall models of the City. Really good to start your Singapore tour from here as you get to see the whole islands, it’s current and future developments which you can identifiy with later on in your tour. As it’s really hot and humid in Singapore, this visit will also give you time to relax and cool off.

After that, take the Kadayanallur Street exit and just across is the Maxwell Food Centre. If you still have food space to spare, grab a chicken rice from the famous Tian Tian shop inside. Lines still form even at 2 to 3pm due to it’s popularity. Anthony Bordaine himself recommends this shop.

After that, go towards the front of the Food Centre and you are now on South Bridge Road, just across will be the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple, inside is a museum on one of the top floors. You are now on one of the corners of Chinatown. After your visit, exit at the back of the temple and turn right, towards the Sago Street which is a walkers street full of shops on either side, turn left and follow the street, towards Smith Street, which is the Night Market and food street! Watchout for the Erich’s Wuerstelstand, an attraction on it’s own, which is a Sausage stall with authentic German/Austrian foods served by the Erich the owner! imagine eating sausages and schnitzels in the middle of Chinatown, only in Singapore! 

Move towards Temple street for more shopping, on temple street, to the right would be the Sri Mariamman Temple, Singapore’s oldest Hindu Temple, amazing as it is again in the middle of Chinatown. To the left would be the chinatown MRT Station. from here, you can take the MRT towards Clarke Quay or Vivo City/Harbourfront to cap of the day. On 
Clarke Quay, the reverse bungy attaction as well as numerous clubs, bars and restos to suite your taste. After Clarke Quay, if you still have energy, follow the river down towards Boat Quay. If your heading towards  Vivo City, you can either grab a Carl’s Jr. or head up to Food Republic and grab either Ban Mian noodles or one of the Indian foods. After eating your fill, relax outside Food republic with a view of Sentosa, Resorts World and Universal studios, while dipping your tired feet on the ankle high water ponds.

An MRT station and Bus interchange just below and across the street and cab lines gives you numerous options to return home and hit the sack.

We ate around 2pm and there was still a long line of Tian Tian addicts eagerly waiting for their turn to partake the chicken rice that sets the standards, Tian Tian’s is the gold standard of chicken rice. I have tasted a fair share of other chicken rice from Hougang, Woodlands, Choa Chu Kang and the CBD, some would cost as cheap as 2 bucks and other as much as 6 bucks. But none can even come close to half as good as the 3.50 Tian Tian chicken rice, or was that 4 bucks, I could not remember, I was too caught up imagining the pleasure of eating the chicken.

Maxwell Food center is just beside the URA and right behind Chinatown, so a visit by tourist or non-familiar Singapore residents would make it worthwhile. The URA has a Singapore City Gallery on the first 2 floors and it is an interactive experience worth taking. Get to see scale models of Singapore Island, development plans and much more. Residents will enjoy knowing a lot more and opens your eyes on the daunting task and execellent results the URA has achieved in maximizing this tiny island.

Across URA is the Red Dot Museum so a stop there would be like hitting 3 birds with one stone for tourist, if you started from Chinatown, that would be hitting 4 birds, if the person was paying attention while at the food street in Chinatown and spotted the German stall in the middle, that is already a bargain 5 birds! I’d like to add that partaking sausages and German cuisine from a tower of a German chef in the middle of Chinatown is in itself already an experience that could only be uniquely Singapore. I’d like mention that the facade of the MRT station entrance on Chinatown is one of the best in the entire city, don’t make the mistake of taking the stairs, it’s a long way up, or down.

This City has so much to offer and one only needs to make the effort to look at the corners and obscure places to see the true Singaporean culture, visit the heartlands as well if you can.

However, as I have stated earlier, here in singapore, it is very much respected. Try to go to a hawker, specially during peak times of lunch and dinner where table space is coveted, you will discover a lot of empty seats with tissue on it. No one takes a seat with a tissue on it. No one would even take it, move it, throw it or even look at it for more than 5 seconds. Even if the tissue does not have a name of the owner or any indication of why it was there. The only thing on everybody’s mind is respect the tissue and move on.

Such is the power of a tissue here, regardless of the maker or distributor, a tissue is a tissue and it has to be respected. So, if you don’t know yet or unaware, now you know and show due respect, specially when you are in Singapore.

I would like to acknowledge that the inspiration for this post came from the mens toilet wherein 2 of my colleagues where talking about this topic(such an approriate place for an inspiration considering the topic of this post).

Image from http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?picture=tissue-box-in-basket&image=4064

The Art Museum is free to visit from 6pm to 9pm, we started our museum hopping with there. The current exhibit of a Chinese master was interesting, the style is new and tickles the mind, as we started with this collection, it felt ok. We moved on to the next gallery and I was in a performance art hall with video screens on the wall, since I am not a fan of performance art, I quickly breezed through it all, the other galleries had more or less the same type of art pieces and installations, provocative and mind boggling, the last 2 galleries had 1 filipino artist with 2 artworks, interesting. The last gallery was a photo gallery and nude sketches.

The Structure itself was magnificent, a 2 story colonial era building with a 3rd floor on each wing and a open space in the middle. It was unfortunate that there was an 8qSAM  on the other side, will have to schedule this for next time.

The next day, we headed of to the National Museum of Singapore, amusingly it’s just across the Singapore Art Museum only the Singapore Management University stands in-between.

The living galleries on the main building were free at certain times of the day but the History Gallery is the main exhibit of this museum. The 10 dollars to see it was very much worth it, it is on the 2nd building at the back accessible from the 2nd floor going down to the first floor. We were provided individual units with headsets wherein we inputed numbers on the floor and a audio describing what you are seeing as well as some commentaries and historical background plays.

As it was almost 6 when we went it, we were not able to finish and our visit was cut short, although the living galleries where still open, we were still a little bit disappointed, will have to make sure that I visit the museum early next time. The museum is at the foot of Fort Canning Park, so after or before the Museum visit, you can still see the park.

The last Museum we visited on our last day in Singapore was the Asian Civilizations Museum, this is all about asian civilization. The Museum structure already has a lot of history all by itself and turning it into a museum was a very good decision. It is on the bank of the Singapore river and at the front of the museum is where Sir Stamford Raffles first landed, at the back is the City Hall, another marvelous structure.

The Museum had an existing Kangxi Emperor exhibit from the Forbidden Palace Museum in Beijing, which had very exquisite and remarkable collections from that era. The other galleries were all about the different civilizations in Asia, with a gallery dedicated for the muslim and hindu culture. There was also a gallery with gold artifacts worn by ancient civilizations.

Again, the 8 dollars cost to visit was well worth it, there is a free museum tour at 3pm.

Museums have lockers so if you are bringing in backpacks, deposit them and have a leisurely museum visit without the hassle of lugging around a backpack. The museums are accessible by MRT and Bus, if your are going by MRT, they are a short walk from the station.

The Singapore Art Museum and the National Museum of Singapore is a 5 to 10 minute walk from the Dhoby Gaut MRT station while the Asian Civilizations Museum is across the river from the Raffles Place MRT station, cross through Cavanagh Bridge, the first cross river bridge in Singapore.