Hot. But Cool.

October 18th 2016

Before Jan starts telling you irrelevant stuff about Singapore, here is what you all really came for: Today's in-flight movie review.
If Cats Disappeared From the World — Japanese Film, very nice, 8.5/10.
Alright, let's continue:

We have arrived in Singapore.
The airport is neat and orderly, and I think it smells nice. As we pass immigration, we get a small note telling us very clearly that we have nothing less but death to fear, should we try to import illegal drugs — I sure hope that the multitude of medication I have with me (Could supply about 3 1/2 hospitals), won't be misinterpreted as such...
As we arrive at our apartment we are welcomed by Davon, a friendly Singapore-Chinese who shows us around. We have our own room and bathroom here for a change. The apartment is located in a residential neighbourhood of Singapore that is exclusively made up of such high-rise apartment buildings. 80% of the population live in buildings like this. One difference to Germany is that these residential blocks are very clean and well cared for, though.
It is quite noticeable in Singapore that more than 70% of the inhabitants are Singapore Chinese, descendants of Chinese guest workers.
Today starts for us at just past 10am — trying beat the jet-lag — as we head to the small supermarket in our block and have breakfast at adjacent bakery.
We take the excellent public transport system to Marina Bay. Which is mostly a large mall. From under the canopy here, we get a wonderful view of the skyline.
The nearby 'Gardens by the Bay' park is a very green spot right in the heart of the city. There's a lot of green here in general — it's not uncommon to see bushes and trees on or even in the buildings themselves.
There we first notice how uncomfortably hot the sun is here — worse (at least more humid) than in Dubai. Still, there is a lot to see here.
While we are taking in the supertrees we hear a rolling thunder from above — a squadron of seven red fighter jets is doing an air show above. A nice British lady explains that those are the British 'Red Arrows' that are currently here in Singapore.
We eventually have to take shelter from the heat in the mall's food court, where we decide to have lunch. The selection of dishes here is so large that we have difficulties deciding on one thing to eat. The food courts here, as opposed to those of Dubai, are not made up of fast food but rather different Asian street foods.

A small excerpt from our conversations:
Jan: [discovers 3 PokéStops with active lure modules] "I love China!"
Me: "We aren't in China."
Jan: "Yeahhhh.... but there's lots of Chinese people here."

Well fed and happy, we move on to the ArtScience museum where we experience many interesting things... (Help, I don't know what to write) (On my way!) There are multiple, mostly interactive exhibits here that are all placed somewhere at the intersection of art and science, as the name suggests. So we roll around on glowing bouncy balls, colour in jellyfish with crayons and slide down some slides — you know, science.
On our way back to the mall we notice that every second person we pass has one to two phones in their hands and connected to a power bank. A bit ahead we see a crowd of people standing around and wonder what they might all be doing there. The answer: They're playing Pokémon. And not just the teens or kids, but mostly grown-ups and even some elderly people. This leads to some bizarre scenes when a mother ignores her whiny child because there is a Magikarp to be caught — I'm joining in.
We both like Singapore a lot — more so than Dubai. We are looking forward to the next few days and I think we will have a lot to write about.
See you then