Day 2 in Singapore and we got up somewhat early and hit the ground running... so much to do and see! We started by getting some coffee at a little coffee place in the basement of the mall across from our hotel... all the coffee here (except Starbucks) is espresso and super strong... that'll wake you up... especially if you're not used to it! We started walking towards the center of the city and found ourselves in many shopping malls...there is A LOT of shopping malls here in Singapore... something like 250! They are all at least 3-4 stories and are filled with all sorts of stores! One that we went to was 6 floors of electronics... ALL electronics.... anything you could possibly think of! It was pretty neat, but after the 3rd floor it all looked the same. It was fun to look around at what they had, but we didn't buy anything here. We learned that every store we went into we were bombarded by pretty aggressive sales people so after a few stores we just looked from afar.We walked down to an upscale mall (which there are also A LOT of here) but they had a big food court and we had a nice lunch there.
Then we walked across the street to Raffles Hotel, one of the world's most famous hotels built in 1899 and named after the founder of Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles. This hotel has an amazing history but we didn't go for the history, we went there because it is where the Singapore Sling originated, apparently invented by a bartender at the Long Bar sometime between 1910-1915! There were 6 different Singapore slings to choose from... I had the original and Damian had the Summer Sling... yum! They also had peanuts all along the bar and at the tables... you throw the shells on the floor... always fun! At some point during this day we were inside one of the many malls and went to use the restroom... well of course in the ladies room there were about 8 people in front of me... I peeked out from the line to make sure there were real toilets inside the stalls as I had already been fooled a few times on this trip... I was happy and relieved to see there was. I waited patiently and when it was my turn I walked down to the end to the open stall to find.... a squatty potty... c'mon... reallly... what the ****(insert expletive here)!?!? Of all the stalls in there it was probably the only one... what luck!!! I didn't want to male a scene and get out of line to wait for a real western toilet, but did I really want to do this... I had no choice... that Singapore Sling did me in! Luckily I had a dress on which made this somewhat easier, but I'm just not a fan of squatting over a hole in the ground... makes me feel like a puppy!
Next stop, Orchard Road... this is basically a big street with lots of shopping... very high end too! The streets were lined by Prada, D&G, Burberry, Hermes, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, and Dior to name a few... obviously we didn't buy anything down there... just window shopped! We walked most of the street and it started to rain so we headed back to the hotel. We took the subway everyday as it was super easy, and very clean too!
Our hotel was located in an area of Singapore known as Clarke Quay (pronounced "key"). It is a large section of bars/restaurants and right on the river. It is really neat at night and during the day too. They have river taxis that take you all along the river to other places in the city! The river looks pretty dirty, but it is supposedly a lot cleaner than it used to be! On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights, they have a river market all along Clarke Quay and a lot of people come out for the nightlife here! At night is is all lit up and really beautiful. Lucky us we stayed a stones throw away and could just cross the bridge and be at our hotel!It was Friday night and we headed out early to hit up happy hour and grab some dinner too. We stopped at a lot of different places including a place called Brew-werks, which is right on the water at Clarke Quay, where we did lots of beer tasting... we did a sampling of some of the beers and then picked our favorites... it was fun! Damian liked Oatmeal Stout and I liked Blonde Assassin!
We also went to a place called "Clinic" that had a hospital/clinic theme... wheelchairs and hospital beds for seats, drinks served in IV bags on IV poles and shots in syringes, and the wait staff is dressed in scrubs... definitely a novelty kind of place, expensive but fun for one drink!
After checking out many of the local bars/restaurants, we headed home to rest up for our next day full of adventure!
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