Singapore the Lion City or to be more clear the MerLion city is a beautiful place and very truly a mini India alias Tamilnadu (you can see a lot of tamil everywhere even in the local train announcements). Its one of the easy access tourist place from India and if you plan it well in advance you can get some cheap tickets (Tiger airways has flights from Bangalore and Chennai). If thats not a concern then you have one of the best airlines in the world, Singapore airlines.
There are a lot of nice places to go around, some of the places that I got to see are as below. I wouldn't have been able to see all these places if I did not had my lovely cousins there. So if you have any relatives / friends there get hold of them.
Sentosa:
There are lots to see in sentosa island, but to be frank one day is not enough to see everything at a comfortable speed, if you have to see everything you need to go there twice.
There are different ways to get to sentosa. You can get into a bus from the sentosa booking counter itself, or else travel by the cable car or even take the sentosa mono rail. My personal recommendation will be to go by the cable car (sadly it wasn't in operation when I went) / mono rail.
The 4-D film experience, yes its correct 4-D not the usual 3-D film, was amazing. The interesting thing about 4D movie is you have special seats and theater for this. Your seats will vibrate to motions and you have speakers in them which will give a very good effect for background sounds, and also don't be surprised to have a few splash / sprinkles of water, so don't have your cameras hanging out. And there are some special things below the seats which will tickle your legs when there is some crawling or creepy things coming around. So its a very funny and thrilling experience.
Next is the 3D log ride, this gives you a real experience of how a log wood will travel if its put in a tricky track. The cabin that you sit in is hydraulic propelled and it will move exactly as how the log wood in the screen moves just to simulate as if you are the log wood. So its fun, nothing scary, but its fun.
Then comes the Butterfly Park which is a treat to watch, here you can get to play with some of the beautifully colored parrots and even feed them in person. Nice place to get those catchy and colorful photographs. The entire zone is a netted area so the butterflies are sort of in there natural environment and it feels good to be there.
The Merlion which is a well known identity of Singapore is another good thing. You can have a good view of Singapore from the Merlion and also you can get a glimpse of Malaysia.
Underwater world, is something which was not all that exciting for me. Its good and way beyond the boring aquariums that we have seen traditionally. But somehow it wasn't that attractive for me.
Last but the best of the lot, is the Dolphin show. Its really surprising to see those lovely creatures responding to their trainers. It seems as if they understand English quite well. I really don't know how they respond to their questions, they are showing some signs when they speak but its amazing how an animal can understand and don't disappoint the whole lot of audience. If you are lucky some random picked audience can actually get into the water and play with the Dolphins along with the trainers. Lovely isn't it ?
Singapore Zoo:
For a change, Singapore zoo is something which is not boring as other zoos that we get to see in India. It has something for everyone, you can get some nice photographs as there are not many grills or fences blocking you from getting a nice view. The animals are mostly in their restricted natural environment. The zoo itself is to huge and at some point you need to resort to one of the vehicles that keep coming around the zoo all the time, its highly difficult to stay on foot all around. Surprise surprise they have some cow's and buffalo's in the zoo which we get to see on our roads.
Also part of the zoo is the Night Safari, but you need to get a ticket for that separately and that happens only in the night. You can see all the animals in their nest at the time and its quite unique. Usually zoos are restricted when it gets dark but here they have a special thing happening in the zoo only when its dark. No flash photography in this area and its nice not to disturb somebody when they are home.
Singapore Flier:
For those who did miss to get in the London Eye, the flier is a chance to get a feel of that. If am not wrong Singapore Flier (179 mts) is a few meters taller than London Eye (175 mts). For those F1 freaks you can get a complete view of the race track from the flier, but I doubt if they operate the flier during the race weekend :-)
Funan Digital Mall:
For those gadget geeks this is the place to end up. You name a gadget / accessory you can get it here and there are loads of shops to blow out all your hard earned money. Can spend hours together just in those 5 floors, this is one of those very few places where you have to literally drag the guys out. I don't remember seeing any girls inside this mall, not even accompanying the guys, if you say I wanna go to Funan, thats it they will let you go, either you have to do it alone or find somebody else who wants to spend some serious money.
Mustafa & Little India:
This should be the final place where everyone will end up, you name it and you get it in Mustafa. Anything and everything is there, and its round the clock, they work 24/7. Little India is the place where you can find most of our south indian hotels like Murugan Idli Shop, Saravana Bhavan etc., etc., and your guess after seeing the name is not wrong, the place is also like India, most of the people around will be our guys, and no rules, littering, etc., etc., You can see some of our hero honda splendor, & pulsar bikes in this area, so be careful.
Cheers :-)
iPrasan.
