I learned one travel lesson, it’s just easier to plan everything ahead of time. I booked the Matchbox hostel back in February along with the rest of my reservations but I only booked one night as everything I found in Singapore was pricier than the other places we’ve stayed at. So I figured once we got here I could shop around or we could extend our stay. Yah big mistake, now we have to move hostels today because Matchbox is full and it’s going to cost more. On the brightside, since they confused our reservation, we got our first night free.
I would say yesterday was QUITE an adventure for us. Also another day of firsts for Alex. Our hostel is only a 3 minute walk from Chinatown so we started there first. Lots of familiar sights and sounds from what I’m used to seeing in Shanghai. I do have to agree with everyone that’s been to Singapore, it is very very clean here and people don’t push each other around like in China.
We grabbed some pork soup dumplings (siu long bao) at Din Tai Fung, they were really good and full of soupy goodness, I burned my mouth because I was so excited to bite into my first one in a long time.
One very impressive thing about Singapore is its subway systems. They have a 3 day unlimited tourist card for $20 to use on the subway. It was Alex’s first time riding a subway, I was amused that he would randomly say during the day “The subway is SO convenient!” Here’s him looking excited for his first ride :/
After lunch we took the subway to the bay front and checked out one of Singapore’s many shopping malls. This one was the Marina Bay. This was a huge mall with shops that I would never go into like Prada, LV, or any fancy store you can think.
There was a casino in the mall and we wandered in. What I found interesting is that if you’re a foreigner it’s free to walk in but if you live in Singapore, you have to pay about $100 USD to get into the casino, basically in this case, the house for sure will win. We left with a net balance of zero so I think we ended up better than most leaving the casino
One thing Alex wanted to do while we’re in Asia was check out an actual anime store. I looked up a few on my phone and we were off to find one. We literally crossed the island twice looking for two stores. Spent 4 hours looking for the locations I found on my phone and the stores moved. At the end of the day we were pretty disappointed but determined to eventually find an anime store so the search continues.
The thing on the top of my list was to eat at Hai Di Lao a hot pot chain that I blogged about last year when I went to Shanghai.
Quick rundown why I like it here so much. We arrived and had to wait about 45 min for a table, they served us ice tea, fruit, cheesy popcorn and banana chips. Ladies can also get their nails done, all for free.
They gave me an ipad to order off of when we were seated. I ordered beef balls, shrimp paste, golden mushrooms, beef slices, tofu, veggies, and hand pulled noodles. Also I got the split broth of Ma La for Alex (he wasn’t really a fan of it) and a tomato base which was really tasty.
What Hai Di Lao is well known for is their noodle dance, they hand pull noodles for you and dance around with them. The guy in Shanghai was a bit more enthusiastic than the one we had last night though.
At the end of the meal you can finish things off with more free fruit (watermelon, oranges, and longan) and almond pudding. Also, you can have the pleasure of using one of these future toilets to *ahem* end your meal
Overall we had a really long day, my fitbit said we walked almost 13 miles in total. I’m looking forward to seeing what food we end up eating the rest of the time we’re here.
