Reverse Culture Shock:

India and Singapore can be exactly compared to black and white; exact opposites.  A dusty, poverty stricken, and chaotic life-style straight to the cleanliest, wealthiest, and organized place I have ever seen.  We ported in the Singapore Cruise Center around 8am.  Getting off the ship was very organized.  We had to walk though a series of security checks, which ended in a very nice terminal/mall.  I could almost add a /mall to every single place I describe in Singapore.  We hitched a ride down town on the nicest shuttle bus I have ever stepped foot of.  The down town/mall is exactly what it sounds like.  If you think the Mall of America is big, you’d be in for an enormous surprise.  Image miles of mall of both sides of a beautifully landscaped street.  Four stories tall, filled with high-end shops.  The basements of all of these malls are food courts, but like everything else is Singapore, these are not your average food courts.  High class Singaporean cuisine: Everywhere!

So after we got a bite to eat I bought a Metro Tourist Pass.  Singapore has an incredibly efficient metro system.  You can by a tourist day-pass for 18 dollars, travel all day long on trains and buses, then return the card for a 10 dollar refund.  So you get basically a whole day of traveling anywhere you want in and around Singapore for around 8 US dollars. 

I volunteered with Semester at Sea’s Global Ambassador Program from 1-3:30.  As part of the program, we were asked to give University of Singapore student tours of the MV Explorer.  I actually had a lot of fun showing off our awesome ship, and it only took up a couple hours of my time.  Plus:  we got all of the extra cookies and pop to take to our room!

We hopped on the train and bus to the Singapore Botanic Gardens.  It was absolutely gorgeous! Home of the largest orchid garden in the world.  It was a nice, relaxing stroll. 

Then we bused and trained back to Clarke Quey, where we found Hooters: Singapore! We had a Tiger Beer (famous beer of Singapore) and a Singapore Sling (super fruity drink but I was told I had to try it) before we hurried back to the ship before On-Ship Time.

Singapore is beautiful.  You could spend an entire month there and probably not get everything done you want to….. but if you spend more than a couple days, you wouldn’t have any money left to spend.

And we’re off to Vietnam!