Singapore

22 March 2012

One day in any country is never enough time.  We had a really hard time deciding what to do with our single day in this fascinating, extremely globalized, small island off the tip of Malaysia. After going through customs off the ship, we realized the walkway took us straight to a shopping mall. The first sign of globalization was right in front of me.  Students came running to the ATM area where everyone was withdrawing Singpore Dollars with Starbucks cups.  Immediately, the group I was traveling with wanted to go get their Starbucks fix.  I ordered a passion fruit lemonade and I was so excited to have a drink that was familiar to me. Even thousands of miles away from the original Starbucks in Seattle, the drinks tasted exactly the same.  I never really understood why they needed to call the sizes of the cups tall, venti, and grande until I ordered my tall drink and it was exactly the same size.  By regulating the sizes throughout the company, I knew that I was getting the same amount of the drink as I would in America.

            Once we finally got through the mall lined with half American, half Asian stores, we took a taxi to the Marina Bay Sands resort.  The taxis were metered and had GPS devices that showed us exactly where we were going.  It was a huge difference from the tuc tucs in India in that he actually took us where we wanted to go and didn't try to rip us off because we were tourists! Inside the Marina Bay sands it looked like the Contemporary Resort in Disney World.  I was expecting a monorail to come whizzing through at any moment.  We wanted to view the top of the resort, which is world famous for an infinity edge pool that overlooks the ever-expanding and developing city skyline. In order to view this pool, we had to either be guests of the hotel or purchase a ticket to the observation deck with hopes of getting a tour of the pool area.  We lucked out and were able to purchase tickets to the top and signed up for a tour. The view at the top was magnificent. Everytime I saw someone walking up to the edge of the pool, I thought they were going to fall over the side of the building. Next time I go to Singapore, I am going to stay at the resort so I can see how it feels to walk to the edge of the swimming pool and off the side of the building.

            After we viewed the top of the hotel, we went shopping.   The mall attached to the resort was incredible.  It reminded me of the Gardens Mall at home in that there were not very many stores that were affordable.  They had all of the classic stores along with many other designers: Ralph Lauren, Gucci, Tiffany and Co., Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Prada, etc. The Louis Vuitton store was the 5^th largest in the world (according to the security guard. Our research ahead of time said it was the largest). Once we walked through the gallery within Louis Vuitton, we took an escalator to the main area of the store. From the outside, this store looked like a glass box in the middle of a lake. 

            Whenever I go shopping in large malls that have the same stores as I do at my local mall, I only purchase goods that I cannot find at home. I looked for something in every store that was exclusive to Singapore.  I could not find anything.  I got extremely frustrated in Armani Exchange.  Why were we shopping in a store I have in my mall, looking at t-shirts that say 'Established in NYC'?  I like shopping at stores that have not been globalized and still have a local feel.

            And then came the food.  When it came to food, I was very happy that Singapore had choices and not just the local food.  I wanted something that reminded me of home, and I was able to have that.  For lunch we went to High Society and I had a crab Caesar salad, club sandwich, and a glass of Moët Chandon Brut. I thoroughly enjoyed the Singaporean taste on the classic American club sandwich.  For dinner we went to Osteria Mozzo. It was a fine Italian dining experience.  I had an appetizer of fresh mozzarella, with an entrée of steak marinated in balsamic vinaigrette topped off with an arugula salad with fresh parmesan and a glass of red wine.