Little India & Botanic Gardens

Day 2 got off to a pretty slow start. I was wide awake by 5:30 am. If you know me (and if you’re reading this I’m going to go ahead and assume you do) you know I don’t really like to see that time of day without having a few cocktails first. But thankfully Friday @ 5:30 am here is still Thursday at 3:30 pm in Chicago. So I could use IM to catch up with my “working” friends back home.

I basically laid around in bed watching Sarah Palin’s reality TV show until around 1. Not because I’m lazy, or because I like Sarah Palin. Trust me. There’s just nowhere else to sit in my room and that was the only thing on TV. I promise. Really!

Anyway, my intent was to get a later start in the day with the hopes that I could make it longer into the night thus sleep in later the next day. Brilliant plan, I thought. But since I started writing this post at 6 am you can tell it didn’t work.

So, after Sarah Palin drove me out of bed, I decided to walk to Little India. It was only 2.2 km from my hotel, which according to my Google math skills equates to about 1.36702 miles. Approximately, of course. My first stop was the Mustafa Center, a 75,000 Sq.ft shopping center that sells everything from toilet paper to TVs. It was really unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. 4 unorganized levels of stuff. I didn’t buy anything because the only thing I needed was butter. And I don’t think it would of survived the walk back with a heat index of 102.  While walking around I kept seeing signs for an Indian restaurant on the roof. I saw a ton of packed authentic Indian restaurants outside of the center, and I really should of tried one of them. But, I went the safe route and ate on the roof at a place called “Kebabs and Curries”. So embarrassing, I can’t believe I’m evening telling you. But it was the best Indian food I’d ever had and I promise that I will get more adventurous with my dining. Here’s a picture of my meal. Normally I wouldn’t post a picture of food but the Asians encourage it 🙂

When I got the check and had a 10 minute internal struggle on whether I should leave a tip or not. I read on the Internets that tipping is not custom or necessary in this culture. But, after working in the food industry for the majority of my 20’s, I just couldn’t stiff the guy. And I’m glad I didn’t because when I left, I forgot my umbrella and he chased me down to return it. It came in very handy at the Botanic Gardens. But, before I move on to the gardens. Let me show you some of the awesome things I saw while wandering aimlessly around Little India.

The sidewalks were lined with merchants, selling all sorts of stuff. Blue jeans, beads, gold, what have you.

My favorite were the stands selling strings of flowers. The merchants were stringing them right there on the street. The colors were brilliant and the smell was unforgettably awesome.

I walked around breathing in the flowers and curry for about an hour before deciding to move on to Botanic Gardens, a suggestion from Vanessa Goh, a very helpful friend who grew up here.I took the worst route by train I could of taken. Took me way longer than it should of but since the trains here don’t smell like 30 day old urine, like in Chicago, it wasn’t all that bad. I actually enjoyed the people watching.

It was sunny when I left Little India but when I got off the MRT at the Botanic Gardens I was really glad I tipped my waiter. (because he returned my umbrella, get it?) But, I didn’t let the rain stop me. I have a feeling if I let the weather determine my plans in Singapore, I’ll be spending way to much time watching Sarah Palin’s reality TV show. Anyway, there’s not much I can say about the Botanic Gardens except that is probably the most beautiful thing I have ever seen on this planet. Seriously, it’s worth the 21 hour plane ride so get your ass over here. I hope I can find an affordable place to live close to here.

It’s the perfect scene for a wedding or a jog, if you’re into that stuff. I spent three hours here, despite the rain. And while I walked through most of it, there’s still a lot I missed. Like the entire rainforest area. A section of the park created to replicate a rainforest. While I didn’t go in, the sounds coming out of that dense forest were incredible. I will go back, with tennis shoes instead of flip flops.

My quest for monkeys continues, but I did see this black swan.

Sorry I didn’t get closer for the picture but I was scared. You can blame Mila Kunis for that. (Mom & Dad that is a reference to the movie Black Swan 🙂

Here’s the Amphitheater inside the park. I wonder if Nickelback has ever played here?

Took a picture of this tree because it has cool roots. Took a picture of my finger because I’m an awful photographer.

I paid 5 Singaporean bucks to get into this part of the park. They really should be charging more. The rest of the pictures are from inside this area. I took so many pictures that my phone battery got down to 10% which is really scary when you’re in a foreign country and relying on your phone to get you back “home”. Here are a few of my favorites.

The picture above was taken from inside the Cool House. An area kept pretty chilly to accommodate the kinda plants that like that sorta thing. Like this carnivorous one below. Don’t worry, I kept a safe distance and used the zoom lens.

Needless to say, there were lots of flowers but I’ll spare you from all my pictures. I remember looking through my family’s vacation photos and seeing a ton of close up shots of flowers and being extremely bored. I’ll just leave you with this last one because the name made me giggle. Because I’m extremely immature.

Ohhhh, and this tree was really cool too. Everyone carved their names in it. I won’t tell you what I carved, you’ll have to come look.

Ok. that’s it for now. Today I think I’ll try and find the ocean. Can’t be that hard since I’m surrounded by it, right? And tonight I’m going to meet a man name Johnstone from NC who I found while looking for roommates on Craigslist. I’m only telling you this in case he kills me. JUST KIDDING MOM!

Don’t get spoiled by these awesome posts. I start work in two days and will have to save my brilliance for the people paying me.

Enjoy your Friday. The future is awesome.