TravelCD

Hello, I hope you are all well, I always wanted to talk about my past travels though I do find recent, say, from three years ago, easier to talk about, since I remember it better, but I’ve always wanted to share my travel experiences further in the past. 

So this won’t really be a review, but me talking about my experience. I’ll do a proper review later though, and it will be more organised.

From further on in my past, I think I was very lucky to have the experience of visiting Singapore. I’m aware I’m in a lucky position where my parents are able to take me and my sister to nice places abroad with them. 

Now my sister and I have jobs, our parents like to go away by themselves more often ha, I think to get rid of us. 

However, I do think Singapore was my last long haul flight with my parents. It was also the only time I had travelled without my sister, since she was away abroad for the first time, in a different country. 

Singapore, is what made me realise that I wanted to copy my sister and travel alone as well. I liked the idea of going abroad by myself, but it solidified into, this something I’m definitely going to do, while I was in Singapore. 

Anyway, Singapore is an amazing, beautiful place. My parents went there to see the Gardens By the Bay, and they are very interested in nature, plants and things like that. 

However, I have to say, even me, who is not interested in gardens, was amazed by the sights. I loved the buildings, the flowers, how green everything seemed to be and I especially loved the food! 

I personally wished I had visited more Hawker Centres! They’re like these groups of food stalls dotted around Singapore. When I heard about them, I thought to myself, well I’m going to have a feast! And I’m going to try everything I can! I even got an app that would tell me when a Hawker Centre was nearby. 

Unfortunately for me, my parents were less interested, so we did not visit that many Hawker centres. 

I didn’t even realise until I got there that the Gardens By the Bay light up at night and the lights react to the music being played, and it was amazing! I didn’t enjoy it as much as I should have though as I was always so tired when we got there, to see the display. 

We also visited a Singapore Zoo as well to see some Pandas and I have to say, unlike when I was a young child, the Zoo no longer excited me and just made me sad for the animals. 

Once I specifically remember was passing this large tank with an alligator inside and I just thought to myself, it may be large, but that still must be too small for them. 

I remember always having fun at Zoos when I was really young, but I think this was the Zoo where I was finally old enough to think about how large or how small areas were for animals, and I hadn’t been to a Zoo for many years before then. The last time I went to a Zoo, I was probably ten or eleven? 

Apart from the sites and food, the other main thing I noticed about Singapore was how helpful everyone was, as someone from the south of England, we’re less likely to help strangers out, but for me, It’s just because I’m awkward and shy with strangers and wouldn’t know what to say! I’m much better with strangers in social situations, like in a café, pub or a group activity, but just walking down the street or on public transport, I’m still shy, I don’t know what other Brits excuses are though!

I once had a bit of a melt down inside my head on a bus because I could clearly see a tourist not from here, unsure about where she was going on the bus and I wanted to help out, but nerves got the better of me! Not only that, but I don’t know why I was so nervous though, and I got very annoyed at myself for not speaking up! 

So yes, anyway I was surprised at how quickly someone from Singapore would notice we were lost and help us out, without us asking! It was super nice of them! 

The food, the food ❤ was also amazing! I especially loved the majority of the Ramen dishes! I will also tell you, if you enjoy spicy food, what I truly loved, and I still miss over here is Laksa! This is the orange/reddish looking food in the pic up above! It is a spicy seafood noodle soup, I thought perhaps I could make my own in the UK, I tried, but it didn’t taste how I remembered it, I even tried microwavable ones that claim to be Laksa, but they’re not good either! It’s so true, the food is better in the country you tried it in! I’ll just go and cry in a corner now, it’s been about five years, but I still miss you Laksa! That was even my last meal at the airport before I went back to the UK! 

Thinking back, I also realised I enjoyed a fruit, we don’t have over here or at least I haven’t seen them, called Lychee, I’d never seen one until I visited Singapore and the hotel we stayed at offered breakfast, and they often had lychee. At first, I was a little hesitant, what is this white ball that looks like the consistency of something slimy? But it actually tasted really nice, or at least I remember I liked them, but I unfortunately can’t remember the actual flavour! 

I also found out about the Durian! I had heard about Durian before, but I never really understood the big deal about it, until I realised that they were meant to smell nasty, and I saw signs telling people not to take Durians on trains, and I thought, wow they must stink super badly! I never really understood that they must stink super badly before I saw those signs! 

Talking about trains, their train system was very easy to use, and it was also very clean! Depending on where you are in the UK, our trains can be fairly grubby, we have got these nice cleaner ones recently but not all of them are like that, this goes for the stations as well, some can look spotless and new, while others can look like someone hasn’t cleaned up in a hundred years, okay I may be exaggerating a little, but some can be quite dirty. 

While as far as I could see, all the trains and stations were spotless, which was nice. 

In Singapore what I also find interesting thinking back, is that there were so many people on electric scooters, many had music playing or glow up lights in the dark. 

The scooter craze I realise has caught on to the UK also, but back in 2018, scooters were seen for children and I certainly hadn’t seen adults with them, so it was surprising to see, but yes, it’s become a thing over here now too. It’s not as common in my area, but I still see it now and again. 

It’s fun to think about things you think as only happening abroad, then you realise your country also has started doing it, like a new fashion a popular person has made public then suddenly everyone starts going, oh that’s a cool idea, let’s do it too! 

What I also loved was there were a lot of buildings with plants all over them, and it was honestly so pretty, I suppose perhaps it’s the climate that allows them to do things like this? 

Talking about the climate, it was difficult for a couple of days, very sweaty and hot, but I think I acclimatised really well, and it was sad to say goodbye to such warm weather. 

And I may be misremembering, but I am pretty sure I was even more disappointed when I came back home because when we arrived back, it was raining! 

It was like the weather was saying welcome back home, to drizzly damp England! 

Noooo… 

To be fair, it’s getting hotter in the summer, it even got up to 40 C last year, that is 104 F for US viewers and which ever other countries uses Fahrenheit (I have never understood Fahrenheit and had to google it, I do prefer Celsius I have to say, like 0 C is freezing, when water freezes and that makes sense to me but apparently 32 F is 0 C?! And I’m like that is really odd to me! No offence meant) Anyway, 40 C/105 F is the hottest it has been in the UK, and it has finally started to get warmer around this time, but once summer ends, the heat will soon leave us for 9 months before it comes back. 

So I guess I’m not different from the stereotype of Brits who like to complain about the weather and I suppose it doesn’t get super cold, but I prefer the heat, okay? I probably sound ungrateful to people who live in much colder climates.

I was talking to a guy from Canada once, and thank god I don’t live over there! Okay, I do want to visit Canada because they look beautiful, but I didn’t realise how cold it could get! 

Anyway, I was talking about Singapore, wasn’t I? 

Loved the food, the scenery, the buildings, the people, really it was just an amazing holiday all round. 

I’ve left out some experiences that I’ll talk about in my review. 

This wasn’t really a review, just be blabbing on about my experience in a disorganised format. 

What I really want to do if I’m ever able to go back to Singapore, is go up that famous ship Hotel, the Marina Bay Sands, apparently you can visit a bar up above, but my parents weren’t that interested until it was too late, and we didn’t have time. 

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading about my experience! I’ll have a review out, probably in about two weeks time.