Travel-Trotter

No chewing gum, no spitting, no being naked… we heard about all the rules in Singapore before we got there, so we fully expected a nanny state, but when we got there but really didn’t see a lot of violation attendants waiting to give out tickets during our stay.  We did really like all the activities for kids that they had, between the super trees, the zoo safari and a harbor boat ride we kept quite busy.  We were lucky enough to stay with our friend Arika, who Maddy knows from business school. She had a lovely home with a great space for us all to stay and was such a kind hostess.  Thanks Arika!!!  The kids got to play with her daughter Anjali and got to play with lots of different toys in their house. The girls were thrilled, as they don’t have many toys with them.  Arika’s neighborhood was very interesting, lots of architecturally significant Peranakan houses.

We arrived on Wednesday from KL and got situated in her house and chatted with her a while before heading off to bed.  The next day we completed school in the morning; Caroline was having a hard time concentrating, especially on writing, so she and Maddy stayed in and finished her work while Mimi and Julie and I went to investigate the Singapore river and the old shoreline.  We learned that the island has been expanded by 23% from the original island especially around the main port area.  In fact the spot where Sir Stamford Raffles landed and founded Singapore is now a freshwater reservoir completely cut off from the ocean.  We walked around the river area and saw the merlion (half lion, half mermaid) that is the symbol of Singapore and the raffles statue and a dozen other beautiful buildings, I even tried a Singapore Sling while the kids got some ice cream.  We grabbed an Uber back to meet Maddy and Caroline before dinner.

That evening we went out and explored the Gardens by the Sea, where they have two huge biodomes and lots of Supertrees.  The Supertrees are water reservoirs as well as solar power generators.  We enjoyed watching the lights come on at night before heading home to bed.

School was a bit better the next day then we all went out for a cruise on the Singapore river (the before mentioned freshwater reservoir).  We learned even more stuff about the city and got great river views.  After the cruise we stopped of and got a snack and a beverage before dinner and the girls played in some fountains and got totally soaked but they dried out quick as it was so hot.

On Friday we took the day off school for good Friday and headed to the River Safari with Arika and Anjali and had a wonderful day exploring all the animals, including a pair of Pandas, a jaguar and a bunch of manatees.

The next morning we had brunch with Arika at a fun place which had an Easter egg hunt, a bouncy house, and face painting. We then packed our bags before heading out to the airport.  Our immigration exit from the country was a taste of the future, we walked up to a kiosk and scanned our passport then a camera attempted to identify us through face recognition, it was interesting but didn’t work for Mimi but they let us go anyway.  Off to Bali and Easter with the worldschoolers.