I thought I’d seen pretty much everything in Singapore on previous visits, but in any place, the longer you stay, the more you discover.
Very early on Sunday morning I snuck out before dawn (which, frankly, is pretty late here on the equator – about 7:30 am) to revisit the free Singapore Botanic Gardens and Orchid Gardens. Singapore actually has three botanical gardens, including a new one that charges $28 to enter, so I opted for the free one. The one I went to was full of European joggers, dog walkers, and Western cruise ship tourists being herded around town on their typical frantic day of in-port sightseeing.
The park is very beautiful, but not much different from the flora I got used to hiking through in tropical Queensland. The Orchid Garden is world-renowned and quite special. They regularly name orchids after famous visitors and have a walk of fame, so to speak. There were orchids named after Margaret Thatcher, Nelson Mandela, and Laura Bush, among others.
Singapore Botanic Gardens Visit
As I left the Botanical Gardens, it was just starting to sprinkle a bit as I headed down the escalator into the subway. By the time I got near my hotel, the sprinkle turned to light rain. By the time I got into my hotel room, it started to pour. And it poured and poured for most of the rest of the afternoon. Guess that’s the trade-off for living in the lush green tropics. Navigating the subways is quite easy and quick, but navigating the bus system here can be a bit more daunting. After a long wait for the rain to clear in my room, I started toying with the idea of catching a cab to a museum. I finally went downstairs to find a long line of people waiting for taxis, which obviously didn’t look promising. The subway was several blocks away, but I noticed a steady stream of buses running by the hotel and ventured out between stops to see where they were going. Fortunately, there was a map of the bus routes posted, and although it took me a little while to figure out how to read it, I eventually concluded that I should be able to get to the Asian Civilisations Museum fairly easily. I hopped on board and jumped off when I felt immersed in a museum district. It was still raining, and I had no umbrella, but fortunately I guessed right and found myself within a block of where I wanted to be.
The Asian Civilisations Museum was in a big old colonial-style British government building that once housed a courtroom, jail, and offices. There were some interesting displays about Singapore’s history as a port and how the British and Dutch became involved in the area. There were depictions of migrant Chinese workers who were lured into opium use to ease their sore bodies from the hard port work, to the point of addiction, which cost them 2/3rds of their salaries. There were also displays of how various cultures in the area came to be there, how rice came to the islands, and special exhibitions from Thailand. Fortunately, after my visit, the rain stopped, and I was able to track down a subway easily after exploring the downtown waterfront a bit.
