Singapore June Return Trip '09 – Second Day and Getting Back

We woke up early the following to get ready for our first show of the day that was supposed to start at 8:30am. From our hotel, we decided to take a taxi to Chinatown Point Mall which was where we ended up at after the abortive public bus adventure the day before. The “Dream-Work” performance was scheduled at the Chinatown MRT station which was near Chinatown Point. It was later that we realized that there was more than one exit from the station and that we were at the wrong exit. Fortunately, we had more than enough time to walk through the length of the MRT station to locate Exit A where the performance was supposed to start. It turned out that we were among the first of the group to arrive that morning and we got a few minutes to ourselves before the performance started.

For “Dream-Work”, we were given wireless radio transceivers and earphones to listen to the dialogue and surrounding sounds that was being transmitted by one of the performers who carried the equipment with him. The audience, which consisted of 12 in our group, would follow the performers through the streets of Chinatown as they delivered their lines live to us much to the amusement of the public who were unaware of the public performance. It seems that on top of having a fixed storyline that the actor would perform, they would add details and descriptions that were improvised on the spot based on the items seen by the actor as we were walking through the fixed route. This made the experience more interesting for me as we would be engaged with our surroundings as well as with the story that was being told.

We walked from Chinatown MRT station back to the Chinatown Point Mall with stops at the neighborhood hawker center before continuing to the offices near the Raffles Place MRT station. Throughout the journey, we heard the story of the female actor starting her day and how her life gets interwoven in her morning rituals which led her to a local temple where she found a spot in the city for some quite self reflection. The performance was definitely a new experience for me as I have never been a participant in a public performance of this manner. I could not help but to wonder if something similar can be performed in KL and it led me to think about the stories that one could come up with on a similar walking performance here.

After the performance ended at a nearby temple, we walked on to the Raffles Place MRT station to get a train back to the Dhoby Ghaut MRT station which was close to where our hotel was. The plan was to have breakfast at the Dome Café at Singapore Arts Museum and then see some of the contemporary art exhibits there. We did end up having breakfast there but by the time we finished, it was already a bit too late to see the exhibits since we still had to go back to the hotel to pack up and check out before 12pm that day. We decide to postpone out trip to the Singapore Arts Museum for the next time we come into town and walked back to our hotel at Bencoolen St. Since we had another show to attend later in the day, we decide to keep out bags in our other friend’s room when we check out and collect them after show to avoid having to carry them during the walking performance.

After checking out, we waited for another friend who was a local who graciously offered to spend time with us to show us around the Chinatown area. It was then I discover that my friend and I shared my passion for kitchenware and we ended up in several shops in the area that sold kitchenware and tableware. Much to my travel companion’s mix of amusement and annoyance, we spent more than 2 hours looking at kitchen utensil, gadgets and plates before we were satisfied. Thanks to the sales that the shops had, I ended up buying a few serving dishes as well as a bamboo steamer at the end of the trip. We also took time to have lunch at a local noodle shop that specialized in handmade noodles which was quite good and later had desserts at a dessert place which specialized in milk snowy ice desserts.

After spending a few hours in Chinatown, our friend dropped us off at the Raffles Place MRT station where the afternoon’s “Dream-Home” performance was to start at 5pm. As was in the morning performance, we were given wireless radio transmitters and earphones to use during the performance. The afternoon performance was performed by another set of actors whose stories did intersect in certain points with the story that we saw performed in the morning. I felt that compared to the morning performance, “Dream-Home” was more scripted and less improvised than “Dream-Work”. We ended up at the flats near Chinatown Point Mall looking out to the Chevron building that towered over the public square at Raffle Place for the final lines of the performance. I have to say that after the novel performance in the morning, I found “Dream-Home” slightly underwhelming.

From Chinatown Point Mall, we took another cab back to the hotel to collect our bags before proceeding to Novena Square where we already made plans to meet up with another local friend for dinner. We ended up having a nice dinner at the Ichiban Boshi Japanese restaurant there until it was time for us to catch the 8:30 FirstCoach bus back to KL. The journey back was uneventful and we arrived earlier than schedule thanks to the driver skipping the schedule stop in highway rest area on the way back. We arrived at the Bangsar bus stop at around midnight where we then took a taxi back to Sentul where our car was parked. We reached safely home around 1:30am and ended our short but fulfilling trip to Singapore.

Singapore June Return Trip '09 – Getting There and the First Day

Our second trip to Singapore in 2009 was planned in conjunction with the Singapore Arts Festival which ran from 15th May – 14th June. A mutual friend of ours was able to get us fairly good deals on a few of the shows as we were booking them as an early-bird package booking. We were supposed to go with the person who helped us get the ticket but she had to opt out of the tip at the last minute and had a replacement person to come with us on the trip. For a change, we decided to travel down to Singapore via bus instead of the previous method of taking an Air Asia flight. After shopping around for reasonable offers, we decided on taking the FirstCoach bus to Singapore on the 6th of June.

Since my travelling companion had to work on Saturday, we decided to take FirstCoach’s last bus of the day to Singapore. The bus ticket cost us RM110 for a return ticket which I thought was fairly reasonable considering how much more we had to pay if we were to take a flight with Air Asia. The last bus departed their office, which was located around the corner from the Bangsar LRT station, sharp at 8:30pm heading south through the PLUS highway. Having not had travelled with the company before, I was duly impressed by the condition of the seats and the onboard movie service. The somewhat recent selection of movies helped me pass the time as we travel down to Singapore with only one 20 minute stop at the Pagoh R&R stop at around 10:30pm.

After the stop at Pagoh, the bus travelled on to the Malaysia side of the Second Link that links Malaysia and Singapore at Tanjung Kupang. Upon arriving, we had to disembark with our passport to go through Malaysian passport control before getting back on the bus which continued on to the Singapore side of the link at Tuas. The journey across the Second Link was smooth and it took us only 20 minutes before we reached the Singaporean Immigration and Customs complex there. We had to disembark again with our luggage this time to have our passports stamped for Singapore entry as well as to pass Customs before getting back on the bus. Once everyone had returned to the bus, we continued on our journey to the final destination at Novena Square.

We reached Novena Square at around 1am in the morning. Since the MRT service had already stopped for the night, we had to get a cab to get to our hotel which was located at Bencoolen St. The taxi driver didn’t know where exactly our hotel was located as it was a recently opened hotel on the street but thankfully I remembered to bring a print out of the address. It turned out that the hotel (Ibis Hotel at Bencoolen St) was not difficult to spot once we drove into Bencoolen St. Since we already had prior reservation at the hotel, we were able to check in fairly quickly and settle in our rooms for the remaining of the night.

The first show that we had tickets for was scheduled at 11:00am on the following morning. We still had to wait for another friend who was coming in from KL on the morning train to Singapore before going to the show. Since we had some time to kill that morning, we decided on having breakfast at Burger King at Burlington Square which was located just across the street from where the hotel was. After breakfast, we ran into the remaining members of our travelling troupe walking down the road to the hotel. After they have checked in, we took a taxi to the Marina Square mall where we were going to participate in the “Etiquette” performance.

We were shown to a pre selected table when we arrived at the Dome Café at Marina Square and given a brief explanation of what was about to happen. In “Etiquette”, we became the actually actors in the public performance. We were given headsets through which we were given instructions of what to say and do. On hearing the cues, we also had an array of items laid out and labeled on the table for which we suppose to interact with. Since each person had only half of the story in this two person performance, we would also need to listen and interact with the person sitting opposite us as directed. It was definitely a new experience for me as not only was I’m actually participating in a performance but it was also in a public place with a small and somewhat disinterested audience.

After the performance at Marina Square, we hung out for a bit to check out the shops there before proceeding via MRT to the Orchard St station where we planned to meet up with some friends who were in town. I have to honestly say that I have yet to really understand the system before being confident of being able to take the MRT in Singapore by myself. I think that with a few more trips on them, I would eventually figure out which lines to take especially in stations with line exchanges. We did eventually reached the Orchard St MRT station and met up with our friends there before proceeding to the nearby Wisma Atria Food Republic for some lunch and to catch up on the latest happenings.

After lunch, we proceeded to do a little bargain hunting starting with the Borders bookstore at Wheelock. Unlike my last visit, there wasn’t anything new for me to pickup there as I guess it was just a few months since my last visit there. After the bookstore, we hit the nearby Toys’R’us store at The Paragon for some board games that I had planned to look for. Didn’t really find any worth buying but I did pick up some travel editions of the games that I thought would be a nice addition to a games night with the gang. We later then ended up at The Heeran Shops for some CD browsing at the large HMV store they have there before calling it a day as far as shopping was concerned. We thought of using the public bus system to get back to our hotel but got on the wrong bus by mistake and ended up in Chinatown Point instead where we decided to be less adventurous and take a taxi back instead.

After a short nap and shower to refresh ourselves, we took a taxi from the hotel to head out to the Victoria Theater for the evening performance of “Electra” by the renowned Suzuki Company of Toga from Japan. A strange combination of Greek story with Japanese traditional Kabuki and Noh performance style, “Electra” was definitely not something that I could have prepared for. Even with the often delayed and, what I think was, paraphrased subtitling, it was a bit hard to follow what was happening on stage. I guess that it was a bit too high brow for my theater tastes which I believe that more than a few members of the audience shared with me. Case in point was the person sitting next to me who was actually sleeping through the show up to the point when they started pounding the drum finale. I’m sure that some people would know who to appreciate this performance but I was fairly certain that it was not something that I was overly impressed with.

We left Victoria Theater close to about 9:30pm to head out to the Esplanade for a late night supper since we had skipped dinner to get to the show. On the way, I got to try one of the ice cream cut from a block and sold sandwiched between thin wafers. I’ve seen them around the city and never had a chance to actually get one. It reminded me of the type that I used to have as a kid but sadly I see less of nowadays in KL. Having the ice cream on the balmy night walk heading to the Esplanade was actually quite fun while the ice cream lasted. Once we reached the Esplanade Mall, we decided to eat at the Thai Express restaurant there before calling it a night and take a cab back to the hotel to end our first full day of the trip.

(Having some problem with my external HDDs where all my pictures have been transferred so will have to wait to get that fixed before I can put the travel pics for this entry)

Singapore Trip '09 – Day 03: Hitting the Malls & Getting Back

Thanks to Air Asia retiming our return flight, we ended up with an extra 2 hours to spend in Singapore before our flight at 7:10pm. Having decided that we would want to try to avoid the evening rush on the MRT to get to Changi Airport, we decided that we would need to make sure that we would be at the MRT heading to the airport by or before 4pm. The plan would give us some time to hit the malls after we check out of the hotel while waiting for our flight. We also had the chance to spend a little more time with our Singaporean host who graciously offered to drive us around town.

Our first stop was at a hawker center opposite the Great World City Mall near the River Valley development area. I have always been fascinated by the hawker food culture and was looking forward to experience it for myself on this trip. Since we arrived quite early, we decided to walk across the street to the mall to browse while the hawkers were setting up for the day. We ended up browsing for books at the Harris Bookstore in the mall which had a book sale on the day that we were there. We didn’t really find anything that caught our attention there but we did end up buying some CDs instead at the That CD Shop store which had a really good selection of CDs.

After our short shopping excursion, we returned to the hawker center where the lunch crowd was just getting started. I had a taste of the local version of the Singapore Rojak that was recommended to me by my parents when I told them I was going there. I have to say that it was quite good especially with the dried squid that they added to the dish. It was also my first time tasting the strange looking century egg which was totally different from the salted duck eggs that I’m more used to. The jelly-like texture of the century egg definitely took a bit to get used to but it was not as salty as I expected it to be.

After my culinary adventure of the day, we proceeded to the Borders bookstore at Wheelock Place near Orchard Road. Having whetted our appetites for books at Harris, we decided to just focus on book shopping for the rest of the day. The Borders at Wheelock was quite big with the expected range of book selections for the bookstore chain. Prices were fairly equivalent to what I could expect to find in KL so I didn’t end up buying much since I already have quite a few books in my to read pile at home. We took a break from book browsing and had some refreshment at the nearby N.Y.D.C Café and Restaurant. It was hard not to be tempted by their line of sinfully delicious chocolate drinks and desserts so we ended up ordering some of them to have there while we rested.

Since my travelling companion was trying to track down a particular book to purchase while we were there, we proceeded to the Kinokuniya bookstore at the nearby Takashimaya Shopping Center in Orchard Road. It felt more crowded than the one that we have in KLCC but I had a great time browsing through their graphic novel section. There were more than a few items there that I would have loved to purchase but I decided to be responsible and defer them when I had more to spare. We didn’t stay long at the book store as they didn’t have the book that my travelling companion was looking for but they did direct us to their branch at Bugis Junction mall which could reserve a copy for us to come and pick up.

We left Orchard Road around 4pm and proceeded to Bugis Junction which was not far from where our hotel was. We thank and said goodbye to our gracious Singapore host there as it would be our last stop before taking the MRT to the airport. We soon made our way through the crowd at Bugis Junction and found the Kinokuniya bookstore fairly quickly as we wanted to make sure that we were at the station before the afternoon rush hour started. After getting the book from the bookstore, we proceeded to the Bugis MRT station to get on the MRT heading towards Tanah Merah station. From there, we had to switch trains and get on the one that serviced the extension line between Tanah Merah station and Changi Airport.

After checking in for our return flight, we went to have an early dinner at the Popeyes Chicken & Biscuits fast food chain at the terminal. We choose it since we both can’t remember is we ever seen the chain in Malaysia and it was near where we checked in for our flight. Once we were done with our dinner, we proceeded to the gate where our plane would be taking off and was soon enough on board for the flight back. Other than a little turbulence on the way in thanks to the raining weather, the flight itself was uneventful. We touched down on time at LCCT and continued our journey on to KL Sentral by the Skybus service. We finally reached home at around 10pm after taking a cab from KL Sentral.

Singapore was not quite like what I expected prior to coming on this trip. Having not been able to spend a lot of time outside of the hotel or office in previous visits, I was pleasantly surprised by the architecture that have been restored and incorporated into the more modern surroundings. There was still a lot of charm to be found in the restored neighborhoods despite the proliferation of more modern buildings in Singapore’s skyline. I would definitely like to spend more time next time to walk around and seem more of what they have restored. Having the opportunity to make new friends on this trip was an added bonus and I look forward to see them again the next time we come into town. Fortunately for me, that would not be too long as we already made plans for a return visit in June for the Singapore Arts Festival.

Singapore Trip '09 – Day 02: A Day at the Theaters

After the late night out, we woke up around 10 am on the second day we were in Singapore. The first show that we had scheduled to see on that day would only start at 3pm which meant we had a few hours free to explore the area. After a quick shower, we went around the corner from the hotel to Purvis St. for a light brunch at a nearby noodle shop. Like many streets in the area, Purvis St was a collection of old shophouses of which some have had their interiors renovated with a more modern look. I definitely loved how they were able to preserve the old building facades and retain the charming character of the area. We were soon joined by our host in Singapore who would be going with us to watch the shows that we had planned that day.

After a wonderful brunch of noodles, we walked towards the Bras Basah Complex for a bit of book shopping. Consisting of 5 floors of book shops, the complex was definitely a book lover’s heaven. There were several shops in the complex that offered used books in a wide range of subjects as well as a big Popular bookstore for the newer releases. There was even a comic book shop on the 3rd floor there for me to indulge myself although I didn’t end up buying anything there as their back issue bins were not really well laid out for me to check their offerings. In the end, we spent nearly 3 hours there just browsing for used books and occasionally finding something that we wanted to get for ourselves.

Before the show started, I made a pit stop back at the hotel to stash away our book purchases before walking down the block to the Singapore National Library building. The show that we were watching that afternoon, Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” presented by the W!ld Rice Theater Company, was being staged at the Drama Center Theater located inside the National Library building. We met up with some friends who were there to watch the same show at the theater foyer for some light refreshment before proceeding to the theater to watch the play.

I have not actually seen a production of or even read the play despite it being one of Wilde’s most enduring pieces. The W!ld Rice production further spiced things up by casting an all male cast for the play and not having actors who play the female roles dressed in drag. They were instead dressed in Victorian inspired suits which, while tailored for men, had a distinctively female feel in cut and embellishment to the design to set them apart from the suits that the male characters wore. I will definitely keep this production in mind as a baseline for comparison with future productions that I might go and see.

We left the Drama Center at around 6 pm to head out to the Esplanade Theater where they were staging Shakespeare’s “A Winter’s Tale” directed by Sam Mendez as part of The Bridge Project. This was the play that we had planned the trip around and I was excited to finally be there to watch it. We made a stop at one of the shops at the Esplanade Mall for some souvenirs before proceeding to the nearby ThaiExpress café by the Bay for a Thai dinner. We made a stop at Max Brenner Chocolate Bar for desserts afterwards and stayed there just until they called the show. Thanks to our friend in Singapore, we managed to get seats which I fairly sure was among the best seating locations in the house where we settled down and waited anxiously for the show to start.

“A Winter’s Tale” was also one of the Shakespeare works that I have never read about before so I came into the show with not knowing what to expect. As the show progressed and I was able to catch on with the language, I found myself mesmerized by both the story and the wonderful performances by the actors on stage. There were parts that was a bit slow and, being as tired as I was already by that time, hard to focus on but there were quite a few moments both in the story and performances that managed to keep me hooked on what was happening on stage. The production was not exactly what I imagined a Shakespearian production to be as while they kept the language of the original text, the production was set in a different setting and age than it was in the original text.

The show ended around 11pm and we took a walk back from the Esplanade to Bugis Street. We stopped for a late night supper where I tried the Singaporean version of Roti Canai and Murtabak. I have to say that I personally felt that the Singaporean Roti Prata was not as good as our local version since they don’t fluff it up like they do here to make it softer. As for the murtabak that I had, it was definitely different than what we know as murtabak here. I didn’t end up enjoying the murtabak I ordered as I had to pick out small pieces of chicken bones that got mashed up with my murtabak filling. Once we done with our supper, we walked down the street back to the hotel where we ended out day at the theaters that day sometime around midnight.

Singapore Trip '09 – Day 01: Getting There and the Night Out

This trip came about early last year when we heard that “The Winter’s Tale” was coming to Singapore as part of The Bridge Project world tour. With the help of a friend in Singapore, we were able to get really good seats for the March show and with that we started to make flight and accommodation plans to attend the show. It was later that we also found out that Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” was being staged by the Wild Rice theater group during the same weekend that we were there. Having not seen a production of the play before, I agreed to include a matinee performance of it in our trip itinerary and got tickets for the show too. In the end, the Singapore trip turned out to be more of a cultural excursion than my usual type of trips abroad.

Since my travelling companion was working on the Saturday that we suppose to travel, we decided to take an afternoon flight into Singapore. We departed from Sunway at around 2pm and reached KL Sentral just in time to catch the Air Asia Skybus to go to LCCT. We were cutting it close since the bus was scheduled to arrive at LCCT around an hour before boarding. As luck had it, the bus that we were on experienced a mechanical failure and we had to switch buses on the way to LCCT. Fortunately we did not have to wait long by the roadside before the replacement bus came but it was sufficient for us to be anxious about missing the flight. We eventually arrived 15 minutes later than scheduled at LCCT and were able to check in 10 minutes before the flight boarded.

Due to the current renovation work, LCCT was bit of a mess. The new international departure terminal was not opened yet the last time I was at the airport coming back from my Langkawi trip last December. It has been now and we were directed to go to the departure gate at the international departure terminal. To get there, we had to go out of the checking area and walk around the building, go up a set of escalators before clearing immigration at the immigration area. It was then another walk down a set of escalators before reaching the departure gates. On the plus sides, there are more shops at the departure area but getting there is a bit of a walk until they finish the renovation work in the area that connected the international departure with the flight check in area.

Our flight took off late due to problems with the power unit that ran the internal air conditioning system. Suffice to say that all of us were happy to finally be in the air after sweating it out for at least 10 minutes while the got the problem resolved. The remainder of the flight passed without incident and eventually we touched down at Terminal 1 of Changi Airport in Singapore. The airport seemed smaller than I remembered it but I quickly realized that the last time I was in Singapore, I came through Terminal 2 via a MAS flight which was much larger. After almost an hour to clear immigrations, thanks to the long queues from several flights coming in at the same time as ours, we made our way to the MRT station at Terminal 2 to catch a train to town.

We got of the Bugis MRT station and walked down the road to look for Middle Road where our hotel was located. It turned out that it was not far from where the station we got off and soon enough we arrived at our hotel. Just as we were checking in, our friends who we already made plans to go out with that night arrived to pick us up. We asked them to wait while we went up for a quick shower and to stow our bags away. Once we came back down, the four of us hailed down a cab right in front of the hotel to go to Clarke Quay for dinner.

Clarke Quay was an interesting place to walk around at night. Consisting of 5 blocks of refurbished warehouses, Clarke Quay offers a variety of dining and entertainment options for visitors and locals alike. I loved the way that the original warehouse facades were retained and incorporated into the modern architecture design of the area. Even with the giggle inducing canopy support struts (look at them from the opposite sides to understand why), it was a nice place to spend the evening at and I hope to get back to again since I didn’t really get to spend much time there during our evening walk which eventually led us to the Japanese themed Central shopping mall. We proceeded down to the food court below it to have dinner at a recommended eatery which served dishes at a fraction of the price that one would have to pay for a similar item in a normal restaurant. Once dinner was done, we took a cab just outside of the food court to go to Kreta Ayer Road in Chinatown.

We started our walking tour of the area at DMYK for drinks. Since we arrived very early in the night, around 9pm or so, the place was totally empty with the exception of us and the staff. We stayed there for just the first rounds of drinks before we decided to move on to the next place just as people started to come in. We walked around the corner towards Tantric and unsuccessfully tried to find a place to sit at the outdoor seating area. We didn’t really want to hang around inside Tantric as the place was filling up fast and they didn’t really have a lot of seating inside that we can go to. After the cursory round inside Tantric, we decide to walk down Neil Street towards Duxton Plain Park to head into Tanjong Pagar.

We ended up at a friend’s drinking establishment near Duxton Hill where we spent most of the night with good drinks and bar food. Since we had an early day the following morning, we decided to call it a night at around 1 am and return to our hotel. We walked down a bit near the area where the Thian Hock Keng temple was located. Like most of the shophouses that we saw during our walk that night, it was beautifully preserved in its original state surrounded by the more modern establishments. I wished that I had more time to walk in the area and enjoy the preserved architecture but we were there to get a taxi back to our hotel at Bugis Street. We finally arrived at the hotel around 1:30am tired but thoroughly enjoyed our night out in Singapore.

Note:
I did bring my camera along in this trip but somehow other than the very few pictures that I took of the hotel room, I didn’t take any pictures at all of the places that we went to. I guess it was due to a combination of not wanting to hold people up while I took pictures and the whirlwind pace of our itinerary there that prevented me from taking the usual travel pictures to accompany my travel blog entries.