The Long Journey to Singapore: Jetlagged First Days

I'm really happy that I can sit here in Singapore and say that the headache of getting here was absolutely worth it. Of course, it wasn't the 22+ hours of air travel from New York to Singapore that was so difficult, but rather the 40 minute trip from Boston to New York that pushed me to the edge of my sanity. Thanks to thunderstorms over New York City, I was unable to make my connecting flight out of JFK on Wednesday.

Not such a big deal it might seem, but when the flight I needed to be on only flies once per day, it cost me 24 hours. I consider myself a mild-mannered person, but the experience at Logan Airport dealing with Jet Blue left me pretty disappointed with the U.S. airline industry as a whole - it's pretty amazing how much more efficient and reliable international carriers are.

After a true test of patience, I rebooked my BOS-NY flight for earlier the next day to minimize any chance of missing the connection again. I was also told to reclaim my bags, and so I did that. Or, well, I at least tried to, but Jet Blue again impressed me by letting my bags leave on the plane without me despite my standing there as one of their associates described the appearance of my bags to the person who was supposed to take them off the plane for me. Thankfully, the brilliant staff at Singapore Airlines were able to track down my bags the next day with less difficulty than I had expected.

En route from Boston to New York, about to land.

My plane at JFK. A relief to see after the wait I'd been through up to that point.

I wasn't the only one eagerly awaiting boarding time.

My most forgettable stay in Germany - catching up on some news in Frankfurt's airport.

Which brings me to the point I'd like to touch upon first. Singapore is one incredible little island. In the defense of the United States and other large developed countries, it has to be easier to manage things when it only takes about 45 minutes to get from one corner of the country to the other, but what is going on here is pretty amazing. The figures speak for themselves (I'm quoting prices in Singaporean Dollars, which there are about 1.2 per US$:

• World's wealthiest nation per capita
• The population is 17% millionaires
• Most billionaire's per square mile
• There are only 2 casinos in the country, yet they gross more revenue than ALL of Las Vegas put together.    The Chinese have more money than they know what to do with, and they are strong believers in luck.
• The country's airline has been awarded world's best airline 17 of the last 18 years
• The country's airport is pristine, and is the world's most awarded airport
• ...and on I could go

But all of these things come at a price, and some of these figures are equally jawdropping.
The cost of registering a single vehicle: Minimum of $65,000 (registration lasts for 10 years)
Then, one must pay import taxes at around 100% of the vehicle's cost.
The result? A Honda Odyssey becomes a $160,000 car. An Audi S5? $275,000
The prices go up with increases in engine size, too, so Ferrari's flirt with a $1,000,000 price tag.

And despite all of this, not a minute of driving goes by without seeing a Lamborgini, Maserati, or some other exotic ride, and Mercedes and Audi are more common than Toyota and Hyundai (well, not including taxis).

The argument, I suppose, is that it makes no sense to pay the $65,000 registration fee just to drive a pedestrian car...might as well get your money's worth?

And then there's housing: Monthly rent for a reasonably nice apartment runs between $10-12,000. Houses can move closer to $25-30,000 in nicer areas.

It is simply mindblowing to me, especially after spending so much time surrounded by poverty in Ghana. I can only hope that this little country's government can continue to plan so well to prevent the economy from imploding.

Facts and figures aside, the country is beautiful. There is no such thing as a pothole, and despite the skyscraping housing developments jamming as many people as possible into what little space there is, there is no shortage of "green" here. And I'm not talking about money this time - I mean plants and trees lining every road and building, keeping with the city's pride regarding its cleanliness. I'll now be using city and country interchangeably, too, as there is only one city in this country, and it's called Singapore too.

But I didn't come to Singapore to do research...I came to have fun. And that's what I've been doing so far. I arrived at Melissa's apartment around 7:30AM on Saturday, my body completely confused as to what time it was supposed to be operating on (still trying to recover from this, I woke up at 4:30 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep). Again, you can see the green that I'm talking about.

Enjoying the view from the balcony, on the 8th floor.

The architecture here is especially appealing to me. I really prefer it to the older types found in New England. Taken inside the courtyard of Melissa's complex.

After settling in and a quick nap for the rest of the morning, I was introduced to an especially awesome restaurant known as Din Tai Fung, and also got a quick tour of the city. And it being a Saturday night, I also had to work up the energy to go out and enjoy the nightlife that Singapore prides itself on (oh yeah, Singapore also has the most expensive nightclub to build in the world, and most expensive mall too). I think going out and staying out late actually helped me to adjust as I was able to sleep decently late the next day, but I was completely wiped by the time the night ending.

No time to waste though, as Melissa and I went to visit the newly constructed "Gardens By The Bay" - a man made botanical gardens of sorts, and a photographer's paradise of sorts. I'll try and limit the number of photos I share just to keep things from getting outrageous, but there are no shortage of things to photograph here.

Man made trees, with solar panels filling out the tops. As time passes, the plants will grow thicker to cover the structures.

Entrance to the "Cloud Forest"

I also took the opportunity to test out the weather sealing of the camera. It's not supposed to be waterproof (meaning I can't take it scuba diving), but it is splashproof. So, I stood over by the railing and looked up. It still works, so that's good.

Looking up.

Basically, this gigantic rock structure has been turned into a botanical gardens and waterfall. The only thing missing was a water slide...definitely wish there was a water slide.

This next photo is really more about the background than the foreground. That's Singapore's Ferris Wheel overlooking the bay. Hopefully I'll have the chance to get on it before I leave.

I may have picked a bad weekend to arrive. Monday was a national holiday, so it's been pretty crowded everywhere we go. This attraction only opened about one month ago, so that probably didn't help either.

Playing with the background again here. That's the famous Marina Bay Sands Hotel. Recently built, rooms in the cheapest tower start at $400/night.

I probably would've been to embarassed to take this photo in the U.S. But here in Asia, EVERYONE has a camera, and everyone seems to love photography. It's amazing how much technology influences the culture here.

The gardens are also pretty high (which is why I want there to be a water slide so bad). I guess I'm a little bit fearful of heights still despite all the things I've been doing to conquer that fear. Here's a photo looking down from the highest bridge.

It's good that we have a shared passion for photography - helps to keep from one of us driving the other crazy.

As scenic as the place was, I could only focus on flower photos for so long. Eventually, I decided to change the target of my photos to Melissa. It's nice to have a somewhat willing subject, and I enjoyed taking the time to try and improve my portrait photography.

I did say "somewhat willing".

And here's one that was a bit more serious. Here I used a very slow shutter speed with the intention of making the waterfall in the background look smooth. Using the slow shutter speed also meant that the bright background was going to be completely blown (all white), which I wanted to do to make things a little more "high key". What ended up happening in addition to this is seen below. The drops of water flying around in front of her face actually left little trails in the air, an effect which I was pretty surprised and happy with. I guess you could call this "artsy"? 

Despite being completely exhausted and fighting my body about when to eat and sleep, I'm having a great time here so far and look forward to the schedule we have ahead of ourselves. The trouble is finding a break from all of the exploring to actually share everything. I think I did okay with the turnaround time on this one, so be patient.

Hopefully my writing opened some eyes to just how interesting this place, and this part of the world, really are. By the way, it is SO humid here. So if you're feeling awfully jealous or anything, think of 99% humidity and often crowded streets. Maybe that will make this little island a little less tempting.

The photo below is my attempt at showcasing the Marina Bay Sands Hotel. It is absolutely huge, and to think that there's an infinity pool on the roof of it (which I'm hoping to visit today) makes things that much more interesting. If you look very closely, you can see a person on the stairwell in the foreground. That should give you an idea of scale.