Pods, Hawkers, & Skylines
Jenny & Adam
SINGAPORE // The last 7 days we have slept on a night bus, in a small diving lodge, and on a night train. Now, we have 3 days in Singapore in a pod hostel. This is like a bunch of giant 3 floor bunk beds right next to each other with a personal ladder to climb up into your little cubby hole. It was a really cool experience, but not necessarily the most spacious of accommodations.
We were across the street from Chinatown, with over 100 different food stalls called "hawkers". One of them just received a Michelin star food award. Around 11 o’clock in the morning we got there and stood in the massive line to get a whole grilled chicken with noodles and rice from Hong Kong Soya Sauce Chicken and Rice stall. It took 2 hours and 40 minutes until it was our turn to order. The chicken was fantastic, but the best part was meeting the guy in line behind us Keith, who lost a bet and had to stand in this line to bring 3 whole chickens to a pot luck tonight. We chatted with him to pass the time, and when we were eating another local lady Maureen asked to sit with us and we talked about Singapore and what it was like years ago compared to now.
After consuming pretty much the entire chicken between the two of us, we walked to the Marina Bay Sands, the famous area that when one hears about Singapore they would think of. The top of the tower has a skyline view that we had not seen in such a long time. It reminded us of New York City and what it felt like to live in Manhattan. It was the first time where we were actually somewhere really “nice” and moderately dressed up, and realized just how different our lives have been the past 10 months. Seeing all of the business people, suits, ties, bank towers on the skyline, and martini glasses, reminded us of the life that we left long ago.
Singapore was probably the nicest city we have ever been to. It reminded us of a combination of Las Vegas, Chicago, and Waikiki. The flight home to the USA is finally booked. We fly to Tokyo to spend a few days and then home.