Living in Japan, we can’t drive down the street without incurring omiyage. So after another good Tamil breakfast, we set off to find bigger malls. We got to one of the bigger ones in time for lunch. We stopped for some fish at Long John Silvers out of sheer curiosity (the teh tarik sucked). The mall was impressive. They were in the middle of a big fashion show, so everyone looked even more stylish than usual.
When I say stylish in Singapore and I’m talking about women, I mean traffic-stopping, Bond-Girl-kinda stylish. When I’m talking about men, I’m referring to an untiring passion for thin, knit button-up plaid shirts with khakis and flip flops; the sort of after-sale left-overs you'd find in the back corner of a Wal Mart. I don’t get how the women can have so much fashion sense and the men so little...and that's me talking...anyone who makes ME look stylish is in deep trouble.
Okay, take a break from shopping and do something for Eiji. See a movie. What’s playing? It’s a choice between Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Meet The Robinson’s. TMNT sure didn’t hold any rep with me, but after Disney’s last attempt at digitally animated comedy, Chicken Little I was ready to take the turtles as the more endurable of the two. But Eiji, sage decider that he is with the Robinson’s and to our surprise it was the most enjoyable animated feature we’d seen since Monster House. It was funny, very funny and in all just a perfect family animation. No eternal classic, but it didn’t need to be.
Okay, back to the food courts a floor down for all kinds of curry and noodles and the nicest shaved ice topped with red and green tapioca. That was easily one of our favorite deserts there.
Now it’s getting late and one thing the Lonely Planet guide listed as essential was the Singapore Zoo’s Night Safari. Always go with Lonely Planet. That was an unforgettable experience. In the darkness, the animals behaved very differently and none of us felt so invulnerable, moving around dark jungle trails among leopards and rhinos. It was magic. The bat house was a particular treat. I was expecting little desert-type bats flitting around my head. This area featured bats the size of foxes. They were beautiful, but It’d have been pretty alarming to have one of those things flying around my head. There were a number of kinds of deer. There were elephants, including a bull. Cats. Hyenas. Lions. Wolves. None of these would be all that impressive ordinarily, but at night, without clearly visible barriers it feels much more acute. The zoo in general was designed beautifully. The sparse awnings and structures swam surrealistically in the inky darkness and murky foliage.
The toilet was particularly neat; the sink bays were walled with thick foliage and there was no ceiling. Fully complimented with motion sensors and all that, but the sinks stood peering into the dark, humid forest with all that wet leaf smell and little noises and movements on the edge of visibility just beyond a short wall.You were clearly outside, but the juxtapositions of modern tile and toiletry trappings in a jungle were again, surreal. I want a toilet like that.
Took a cab back to the hotel. The driver was a nice guy and we talked about the situation of Singapore. He said it used to be a prime destination for vacationing Japanese until SARS 5 years ago, and that even thought the epidemic has passed that the economically vital throngs of Japanese tourists never returned. He was pretty annoyed about it. He must know a lot of people whose businesses suffered or failed as a result. But he and everyone I met was proud of Singapore.
No comments:
Post a Comment