Since my dad had been on frequent work trips
within India, mostly flying between Hyderabad and Bangalore, he had the
privilege of getting frequent flyer miles. In fact, the miles were acquired to
such an extent that they were sufficient for a two way trip to a foreign
country not far off from India. Thus, the miles were redeemed for a two-way
free air travel from India to Singapore, for a family of three.
And so, this is the story of how mine and my
mother’s first trip beyond India’s boundaries shaped up (my dad had already
been abroad earlier). It was the summer of 2000 when the plan materialised.
Being our first trip abroad, we were naturally excited and full of
anticipation.
Sometime in the month of May, we boarded the
flight to Chennai from Hyderabad. A connecting flight took us through a 8-hour
journey to the island of the Republic of Singapore. We landed at Changi Airport
which is built away from the land, out into the Indian Ocean.
The name of Singapore finds its roots in the
Sanskrit language. Singapore, originally adapted from the name “Singapura” (Lion
City), which in turn, comes from “Simha” which is Sanskrit for Lion. It is
located between the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, just at the
southernmost tip of the Malay Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is the second
smallest country in Asia. The main island is diamond shaped and has a total
area of 648 square kilometres, three times the size of Washington D.C. The
coastline of Singapore spans 193 kilometres.
So, coming back to Changi Airport. It was
very huge and incredibly beautiful. It was like no other airport we had ever
seen. The airport shuttle dropped us off at our hotel. We were awestruck at the
metropolis and the tall buildings lining the city’s skyline.
Later in the day, we visited the Singapore
Zoo, located on the outskirts of Singapore. The zoo was built inside a forest
so jeeps were employed to take visitors from the entrance to the interior of
the zoo. We had a lot of walking to do but we enjoyed the sights in the zoo. We
even took a photo of ourselves carrying oraguntans on our lap. The safari took
us to the forest and we saw a lioness with her cubs in addition to other wild
animals. The zoo tour took most of the day and in the end we were exhausted.
The second day of our stay on Singapore
started with a visit to the Singapore Cricket club followed by the Singapore
Diamond Gallery. Later on, in the day, we visited some of Singapore’s famous
shopping malls. In fact, we felt that the number of shopping malls outnumbered
the office buildings. We had our lunch at Little India, a small cute town in
the city. The post-noon part of the day was spent travelling to the Mt Faber
Hill, which overlooks the Singapore port.
On the third day of our trip, we began a lazy
morning by strolling through Singapore’s malls and clean-swept roads. In the
afternoon, though, we were in for something pleasant. We boarded a cable car
from Mt Faber Hill, which took us to Sentosa, via Harbour Front Tower. Enroute
to Sentosa, we could see the bustling activity going on at the Singapore port as
the cable car glided above it. Once at Sentosa, we boarded the Sentosa Monorail
which took us from the beach to the Fort Siloso Monorail station.
We visited
its famous attraction-Underwater World, an underground oceanarium housing all
kinds of deepwater sea creatures. It has 2500 marine and fresh water animals of
250 species from different regions of the world. We spotted a white shark as it
hovered over us, the travelator moving us further into the glass-encased
tunnel.
At Sentosa, we also saw the Merlion Statue, currently
the symbol of Singapore, Fort Siloso and the Surrender Chamber wax museum. The
museum housed very life-like replicas of people, mostly the natives of
Singapore. The Musical Fountain enthralled us with its music and fountain
dance.
We boarded the Sentosa bus which took us back
to the mainland.
For our last day in Singapore, we booked
ourselves for a one-day tour of the city with a local tourist agency. They
started the tour by offering us a visit to the China Town. China Town is a
small market selling mostly Chinese-made antiquities, medicines, and clothes.
We saw jars containing dead snakes in some of the shops. The sight of snakes
made me uneasy followed by the Raffle’s Square, a posh area located in
Singapore. There was Raffle’s Hotel and Raffels shopping mall located on
Raffles Avenue.
We had our lunch at Little India and as usual, our
post-afternoon event included scouring additional shopping malls. In the
evening, we re-joined our group and had a cruise on the Singapore River
followed by dinner at a Chinese restaurant where they had rice sticks instead
of forks and spoons, served crabs, lobsters, prawns and every other kind of
seafood. We then went to a local shopping arena to buy souvenirs and presents
for our relatives back home.
The next day, we were supposed to board the
flight to Chennai in the midnight hours, which, was delayed by quite a long
time(7-8 hours) due to a technical snag. So most part of the day was spent
strolling through the Changi Airport and browsing through free magazines, and
enjoying free food provided by the airlines. We were glad to be back home after
a tiring return journey. But we did bring ourselves golden memories to cherish
for the rest of our lives, as exemplified by the fact that I am able to
remember all these events despite them having occurred 12 years ago, and not
having recapitulated any of it in a diary.
