National Stadium

When we started noticing slightly unusual traffic on Nicoll Highway:

Hmm…

..kind of looks like… tanks?!

…yep…definitely tanks.

You ask why there are tanks driving around downtown Singapore on a sunny Saturday afternoon? Singapore is turning 50 this year. As every year, the Singapore Armed Forces will put up a great show at the National Day Parade (NDP). Except this year it will be bigger. Much, much bigger. So there rehearsals now every Saturday until August 9th.

Everything is taken from the baracks and shown off.

Impressive!

Also part of the show: small boats…

…and slightly bigger boats.

A couple of hours later we’ve moved on to a different location to watch the sunset on this beautiful day:

View towards the Central Business District

When the Singapore Air Force also started their rehearsal:

The flag being carried by a Chinook

Flying past Marina Bay

Followed by a couple of Apaches

Next up: the RSAF Black Knights (F-16s) along with a squadron of F-16s

F-16s

Flying past us

Close-up of a Black Knight (RSAF aerobatics team)

C-130 along with two Fokker 50s

Last flypast: KC-135R with a G550 behind it, escorted by F-5S Interceptors

Flying off into the sunset

It will sure be an impressive show on National Day! There will be more rehearsals, so try and catch some of the action!

Singapore Airlines is one of those sneaky airlines that imposes surreal fuel surcharges on award tickets. Luckily there are countries out there who have forbidden such games, including the Philippines. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you might connect the dots now and figure out why on earth I would travel to Manila. That’s right – to start the first leg of my ticket to Europa, via Singapore. The same ticket originating in Manila, connecting in Singapore to Europe costs 22 SGD in taxes and fees versus 250+ SGD if originating in Singapore. And the miles required are the same. So even though I had to fork out a bit of cash to fly to the Philippines, I couldn’t turn down the opportunity.

The flight from Manila to Singapore was uneventful. I was primarily excited for my onward journey from Singapore. I had booked a nine hour layover to go to the city in order to collect my 50kg of baggage. SQ has a dedicated First Class check-in area in Terminal 3. From there its a short walk to a dedicated immigration and another short walk to the lounge. The lounge concept is funny – you enter the general Krisflyer lounge. From there they escort you into the First Class lounge. And once in the First Class lounge, they escort you into another lounge inside the lounge exclusively for A380 Suites passengers.

For you meme lovers out there

By the time I got there (my departure was schedule for 1.40am) there were only passengers of a few flights left. Soon after, the Zurich passengers were the only ones left. And that remained that way for a while… because our departure was eventually delayed to 4am. Not off to a good start.

But once onboard that quickly changed. The A380 is probably my favorite plane in terms of passenger comfort, especially in Economy. But also in First Class, it is not too shabby. My flight last year with Malaysian Airlines in First was great and so was Lufthansa’s First a few months later. SQ, just like Malaysian Airlines has their First Class section on the lower deck, while Lufthansa has theirs on the upper deck. The lower deck is wider, so the cabin feels more spacious.

Suite 2A

Suite 2A

Waiting for take-off

I don’t think words are needed to describe the experience, only photos will do the fabulous SQ Suites product justice. Needless to say, I slept well within a few minutes of take-off.

Suites in row 2 can be extended into a queen size bed

Watching a movie in my suite

Appetizer is being served

… followed by a Boston Lobster Thermidor.

And some cheese to end “dinner” (my body clock was slightly messed up at that point)

Back for some more snoozing

Until champagne (Krug or Dom) brunch is served

The crew was fantastic. As President-elect would say – great people. 

Please put your suite into an upright position as we have started our descent.

View from 30’000 feet

Approaching Zurich

One more view towards Suite 2A

If you have the chance to book this, don’t hesitate. It’s an incredible experience or as President-elect would say – tremendous.  I don’t think 13 hours onboard have never gone by so quickly.

In the meantime, I’d like to share some observations when it comes to changing money. For the past couple of years, I have not really relied upon money changers but instead relied upon credit cards that allow free withdrawals to get cash upon arrival. Unfortunately my go-to card has recently stopped to reimburse ATM-imposed fees. These can be fairly steep; in Thailand it is usually 200 THB (8 SGD), in the Philippines 200 PHP (6 SGD) or in Vietnam 60’000 VND (4 SGD). So I once again started looking at changing money in Singapore before heading abroad. Also, for my recent trip to Central Asia I knew I’d be better off bringing US Dollars – especially in Uzbekistan.

If I had to change in the past (usually small amounts < 200 SGD), I’d just do it at the airport. But with bigger amounts (I changed around 2’500 USD for Central Asia) I started shopping around. I used an app called Get4X to compare rates, but found it to not always be very accurate as money changers didn’t seem to update rates very frequently. The best bet seems to be (surprise, surprise) Change Alley at Raffles Place. There are several dozen money changers and you can very easily compare their rates.

Recently I changed 500 SGD in Thai Baht. The best rate I got at Change Alley gave me 12’550 Thai Baht.

500 SGD in Thai Baht

Around the corner from my house is a hotel with several hundreds of rooms and tourists checking in/out nearly 24/7. Right next to the hotel is a money changer that advertised “no commission”… as they all do. Sure, he didn’t charge any commission but his rates were so bad that on the above transaction, it would have netted me the equivalent of 22 SGD less in Thai Baht. That’s an over 4% worse price for an identical product. For small amounts it may not be worth to travel down to Change Alley but for bigger amounts do your homework and shop around!

However, one fruit that seems to be consistently absent from all markets here is the Indonesian avocado. And I care because it is one of my favorite fruits. Don’t get me wrong, I can get avocados in every supermarket here but they are always from Australia or the USA and the small kind with wrinkly skin and are expensive. They taste just fine but I just can’t understand why nobody sells the bigger and cheaper Indonesian version.

I only found out about the Indonesian avocado during my trip to Flores.

Indonesian avocado at the market in Bajawa, Flores

I mean, look at these avocados: huge, tasty and if I remember correctly, around SGD1 for a kilo.

Some of the best avocados I had in a long time

After returning from Flores, I searched high and low for them. I found some (although not quite the same size) at Geylang Serai market. Unfortunately that market is closed until mid-November 2016 for renovation works.

Does anybody know why Indonesian avocados are not more prevalent in Singapore?

Scoot 787 at Changi Airport

While Scoot is a low carrier, they do offer something they call ScootBiz, which implies it is a business class product. The front of the cabin has five rows of 2-3-2 ScootBiz seating. These seats can be either outright purchased or through a “bidding” options whereby one can offer an amount starting from SGD80 up until 25 hours before departure. I’ve previously done so on the China red-eye flights which usually had a sector length of 4-5 hours in the middle of the night. Hence, I didn’t really experience much of the service but slept the whole way.

The “ScootBiz” seat

On today’s flight to Amritsar, India I again scored a “Biz” seat for SGD82 which came with a check-in luggage (for which I would have had to pay SGD30 anyways) as well as an overpriced meal and drink worth SGD17. While the product as such is fine, I can’t help but to notice that the marketing and product management teams at Scoot seem to have a disconnect. I think the product management team ordered a premium economy product and this somehow didn’t get through to marketing since they are selling business class. See, when a product is marketed as business or similar, I have certain expectations. Below is an overview of my “business class” expectations and what Scoot delivers.

Now don’t get me wrong, I know this a low cost carrier and this extends to the front of the cabin. The only thing I trying to point out is that the product offered resembles more of a premium economy class than business class. Call it premium economy and I’d find it 100% appropriate. But for calling it “Biz”, it does fall short of expectations.

I’ve had far better Mutton Biryanis in the air

Probably I just shouldn’t pay attention to what the marketing folks call it and instead judge it based on the price I paid.

Bukit Timah is the highest point in Singapore with an impressive elevation of 163m. However it is also on of the largest areas of primary rain forest left on the island.

We met early in the morning at Byx, a mountain bike rental shop where you can get decent bikes and helmets for S$40.

The trail is about 6km long and took us around 1h20mins to complete. It was a lot of fun! Make sure to bring plenty of water (at least 1.5l per person) and go early.

Inside Dairy Farm Nature Park

Most of the trail is inside the forest, only small stretches are out in the open

The biggest star in the industry, Rajinikanth, is one of Asia’s highest paid actors and stars in Kabali, this year’s Kollywood blockbuster. The movie takes place in Kuala Lumpur, hence the Malaysian and Singaporean Tamil population (around 7% of the population) have been quite excited in the past weeks. Air Asia even painted an aircraft to promote the movie.

Tickets went on sale only about 24 hours before the first screening due to the pending rating by the Media Development Authority Of Singapore. I was lucky to be among the first to book a ticket online before the servers crashed when the booking site opened.

So last Saturday night six of us (almost the only non-Tamils) in the cinema went to see the movie. It was quite a cultural experience. When Rajini first appeared on the screen, the entire theatre was cheering. We enjoyed the movie but probably won’t be watching a Kollywood movie every weekend from now on. Go see it if you get the chance!

Kabali ads outside Rex Cinema

Kabali ads outside Rex Cinema

Kabali is the only movie that Rex is showing at the time – there was even at show at 4.15am due to popular demand

The whole stretch is about 8km long and took us around two hours to walk at a casual pace including a lunch stop. Even though we walked in the midday sun, we enjoyed the  excursion and got to see a new part of the city. All along the track, the paths and surrounding nature is very well maintained!

Kallang Riverside Park to Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park – near Kallang MRT

Kallang Riverside Park to Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park – housing in Whampoa

Kallang Riverside Park to Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park – near St. Andrews Junior School

Kallang Riverside Park to Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park

Kallang Riverside Park to Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park – near Toa Payoh

Quick break for chicken biryani

Entrance of the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park

Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park

The first park I’ve ever seen with a McDonald’s inside. Instead of heading home, we did a small detour to Lorong Buangkok, Singapore’s last Kampong style area (traditional village). Definitely a contrast to the rest of Singapore’s residential areas.

Surau (Islamic assembly building) at Kampong Lorong Buangkok

After an interesting (but also exhausting walk) we made our way back home – using UberPool (basically sharing an Uber with others) for the first time.

For a while I’ve been intrigued by the Chinese Transit Without Visa (TWOV) program that let’s selected nationalities transit at selected airports from 24 to 144 hours (depending on the airport). It is only available if you fly non-stop into and out of China. Passengers must have confirmed onward tickets to a third country (not the PRC, and not the country from which they arrived). There is a very good thread on Flyertalk explaining the rules.

Back in April, AirAsia announced that they would start flying from Johor Bahru (a few miles north of the Malaysia-Singapore border) to Guangzhou. This could be combined with a return flight from Guangzhou back to Singapore on Scoot and I would fulfill the requirements for the TWOV. I ended up booking the following itinerary:

AK1394 JHB2200 – 0200+1CAN

TZ127 CAN0345 – 0815SIN

AirAsia started promoting the new route with introductory pricing of MYR96 (SGD32) for the four hour flight. The return on Scoot ended up costing CNY418 (SGD87) including an annoying SGD10 credit card surcharge…

So for an overall SGD119 per person we booked our Guangzhou trip.

Maybe not the most direct transit through China that has ever been booked.

I traveled with a friend and our trip started out by taking a Malaysian taxi from Ban San St. Taxi Kiosk at Rochor Rd Friday evening across the border to Senai Airport north of Johor Bahru.

Senai Airport entrance

We were slightly worried whether there would be any complications at check-in since we did not have visas and the Guangzhou flights just started two weeks prior and probably there had not been many guys with an itinerary like ours. But we did not encounter any issues and spent the next two hours waiting for our flight. We arrived quite a bit early since traffic at the border is unpredictable on a Friday evening.

Check-in hall at JHB

Not too much action at JHB on Friday evenings.

Our ride to Guangzhou

The flight was a typical non-eventful four hour AirAsia experience and we arrived at an empty Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport on time. At immigration we were directed to the “Special Needs” lane and were processed without any awkward questions within a few minutes. Having a printout of your onward ticket does help! We hopped into a taxi and reached our hotel, the New World Hotel just a bit over an hour after landing around 3.30am.

The New World Hotel entrance

The hotel was in a good, central location and clean. We paid around USD63 and got a nice room. Would I stay here again? Probably. Was it a classy hotel? Nope. They sure did have a good photographer for their website though!

After sleeping in Saturday morning, we went out to explore the city a little bit. We started out with a temple around the corner from our hotel, the Guangxiao Temple (光孝寺).

Entrance of the Guangxiao Temple

Inside Guangxiao Temple

Inside Guangxiao Temple

Inside Guangxiao Temple

Inside Guangxiao Temple

Inside Guangxiao Temple

From there we walked through some back alleys to another temple, the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees (六榕寺).

Guangzhou back alley

Resident door signage

Temple of the Six Banyan Trees

Temple of the Six Banyan Trees pagoda

That was then enough culture for the day and we hopped into a taxi that would take us to Qingping Market, the place to go for agricultural complementary products and traditional Chinese herbal medicines (not that we were intending to buy either of these).

It was interesting but didn’t manage to capture our attention for more than half an hour.

Inside Qingping Market

Inside Qingping Market

Tea on sale

Our next stop was the Baiyun World Leather Trading Center, the place to go for… leather goods. We took Guangzhou’s modern subway system to get there. I did not take many photos inside this complex – for obvious reasons sellers were not too keen on taking photos.

Entrance of the Baiyun World Leather Trading Center

After the short night we started to get tired and decided to take it easy for the rest of the day. Trying Uber for the first time in China, we drop to the “Party Pier”. This area south of the Pearl River (or Zhujiang) used to the location of the Zhujian Brewery and has now been converted into a bar and club area. Quite well done.

Crossing the Pearl River on the Liede Bridge

The Canton Tower (广州塔) – completed in 2010 and currently the the third tallest tower in the world (595.7 m)

View of the Guangzhou central business district

The Party Pier

Former part of the brewery now converted into shops and restaurants

All restaurants have a Western twist… American steakhouse, American seafood, Mexican, Italian etc. We got ourselves comfortable at McRocky, a Western-themed steakhouse with nice views on the river.

Pearl River Cruise

At 9pm the Euro Football Championship game between Switzerland and Albania started which we watched.

Switzerland (1) vs Albania (0)

After the game ended around 11pm we ordered an Uber and headed back to the airport, getting there just before midnight. By now we were very tired and check-in wouldn’t open for almost another hour. Needless to say, it was not the most pleasant part of the trip while we waited for our 3.45am departure to Singapore.

Scoot has a program whereby one can bid for an upgrade to their “business” class. I consider it more of a premium economy however it is a signficant upgrade from the 3-3-3 configuration in economy. As on my previous Scoot flights, I bidded the minimum amount possible (around CNY350 – SGD74) and ended up getting the upgrade.

Gate A106 at 3am

Scoot’s premium cabin

Back in Singapore

We landed at Singapore over an hour early and as always were quickly through immigration. Exhausted but happy, we were back from our Johor Bahru to Singapore via Guangzhou trip and had managed to transfer through China without a visa.

However their fabric selection for casual pants is rather limited. So recently I visited the People’s Park in Chinatown where there is a large number of fabric shops on level 2. The selection is vast and for about SGD30, you can purchase more than enough fabric for a pair of pants. Back at Lai En, they had no issue using the fabric I brought along and for a further SGD40 I got a pair of custom made pants.

Fabric shops at People’s Park

Fabric shop at People’s Park

While certainly not the quickest (and cheapest?) way to get tailor-made pants, it was fun choosing the fabric myself. If you are of the opinion that Lai En in Hougang is a bit too far away from Chinatown (and I tend to agree), there are tailors at People’s Park as well (for example, Four Seas Men’s Wear, #02-1100).