Lifestyle in Singapore-Guest post

This is the first guest post in this blog, introduced as an experiment. As all these years I’ve been writing India based articles, thought of providing some international content to my readers. My engineering classmate SriHari has recently relocated to Singapore for higher studies and he had lots of observations to share about the place from his initial few weeks of stay there. Sharing below, few of his observations related to food, environment, culture and public transportation in Singapore, in his own words. Let me know if you like this idea of reading 3rd party contents in my blog.-Shrinidhi

Lifestyle in Singapore- by Sri Hari S J

We arrived at Singapore on 21st July. As usual, our plane was 3 hrs late. We were supposed to take off by 11.05, but the flight took off at 2:45 AM. We landed at Singapore by 10:30 AM Local time. Took taxi to NTU directly. It started to rain by 11:15 AM. Man, was it a down pour......... Raining stopped at 6:30 PM in the evening.

Coming to the various aspects at Singapore:

1) Food.
Let me make it absolutely clear that Singapore is STRICTLY NOT a place for pure vegetarians (people who do not even eat egg). This is a heaven for non-vegetarians and people who are ready to experiment with all kinds of things to eat. We need to search a place where we get some vegetables to eat. One thing good about this place is we get very good fruits and vegetables. All kinds and variety at that. But, we cannot survive on fruits and vegetables alone....:-)

We cannot even take chips and snacks, because you get all kinds of chips made from sea and animal organs, Even getting a good pastry is tough. Finding a decent bakery is tough. Like Aloo-bun from Bangalore, we get mutton, prawn and crab stuffed buns,
Slowly, with the help of my cousin, we found out a place where we get food for Buddhists. Here, we only get vegetables. It seems at these places, vegetables are substituted to meat and other non-veg stuffs. We can eat various cuisines from places like Thailand, China, Indonesia and others. Catch is all are vegetarian. ;-)

2) Environment
Singapore is one very beautiful place. Bangalore is nowhere compared to the amount of greenery here. People are VERY orderly. You have Q-system everywhere. Streets are very clean. This is a paradise for automobile enthusiast. I have seen all kinds of cars and bike here. Even went to a stage to ask the price of Yamaha R1.;-)

There is absolutely NO wind movement. All the leaves will be absolutely still. That is why you have no dust particles floating around in the air.

Continuing with the Environment aspect, weather here is pretty hot and humid. I am really having a tough time in washing my cloths. All clothes I wear will be wet the moment I step out of the AC room. It can be concluded that Singapore is literally run buy AC alone. All public places other than Bus stops are Air conditioned.

3) Culture in Singapore
Till today, I never say ANYTHING that is local to or indigenous to Singapore. This is one BIG mixture of all cultures. We get to see people from around the world in some corner of Singapore. Within first 4 days, I met guys from Sri Lanka, Mauritius and of course Pakistan. We plan to have a tri-series cricket match someday. ;-) We have people from Bangladesh also.

4) Public transport in Singapore
There is no doubt that the Public Transport system in Singapore is simply excellent. Everything is orderly and well maintained. As usual, all the transport systems here are Air conditioned.

You guys have heard about Hyundai Sonata/Embera right? If not, I would say to look around Bangalore. This car, in India is a premium segment automobile with a price tag of above 15 Lakhs. Here, it is a common Taxi!!!!! :-) (refer image)

People here do not buy cars as an investment nor for the greatness of Automobiles/Engines. They buy it because it determines the individual's social status. I heard some person in Singapore sold his AUDI A4 for a Mercedes Benz. If you ask me, this is the most stupid thing for an individual to do......

That's all for now.....Until next time....
Nov 2009 update: Sonata Emberra photo by Partho. Also check out: Jurong bird park, Singapore * Malaysia petronas twin towers * Singapore flier *