Singapore weekend
Last weekend I hopped a cheap, two hour flight from Bangkok to visit my friends in Singapore. They've been working there as scenic artists for the last four months, painting a roller coaster at a theme park. Once I arrived and settled in at their very nice hotel (loft room! pool! free breakfast with omelette bar! no bugs!), I headed over to visit them at work. It was really neat to see a roller coaster in the process of being built, but more importantly, I love seeing what my friends actually do for work. After that we took a stroll around the theme park, though I didn't feel up for any of the rides.
The thing you notice about Singapore right away is the architecture. It's in constant development, a special type of ostentatious, riding a fine line between interesting and tacky.
It's also ridiculously expensive, feels like New York in price. So Sunday we ate at a hawker center, which was really cheap and good. I've been wanting to go to one since I read a long New Yorker article on them some years ago, so that was fulfilling.
Saturday night we went to a club to see a couple DJs from Detroit; it was exactly what I expected. Cheesy, expensive, sanitized, though upon leaving the streets were lined with people straight up passed out on the sidewalk. They give the death penalty for drugs, but blind drunkenness in public is readily accepted...strange.
I spent a lot of time in pools, too. It's so hot there now, after a few minutes outside all you want to do is swim or sit in the AC. My last night there we went to a rooftop barbecue with some of their coworkers, complete with pool. They made Singapore Slings, which I'd never had; they are delicious, if a bit sugary.
I probably could have used one more day there, there were a few more sights I could have seen, but honestly a weekend was enough. Even with a free place to stay it was quite expensive.
So now I'm back in Bangkok. I had planned on just hanging around the city until Friday, when I fly to Hong Kong, but I met a nice French girl at my guesthouse last night and agreed to go to Kanchanaburi with her today. It's a quick (three hour) bus ride, and sounds like a nice little overnight getaway. Plus I remember watching Bridge on the River Kwai with my dad as a kid, so now I get to see the real thing.