Must See Things To Do In Singapore - 30 favourites

Singapore flag

1 Open top bus tour

You are forbidden to eat or drink on trains. But by a Kit Kat. Watch out for the flavour. Asian KitKats also come in Green Tea flavour.

2 Free waterfall in Jewell at Changi Airport

Waterfall at Jewel has a nightlysound and light show.

Does the sound of running water make you think of going to the toilet.

Look for a bidet style sign on the doors of the ladies toilet in the airport terminal.

At the airport and around town look for a bun filled with been paste.

3 Butterfly Garden in ChangiAirport



4 Fish head curry on banana leaf plate in Little India

5 Mustapha's 24 hours 2 block department store and supermarket and walk along Little India, or back to Farrer Park ecological shopping mall to visit Daeso.

6 Ngee Ann city basement ; walk underground to orchard MRT and above it Ion and end at Daiso bargain shop for shopping where everything costs $2..

7 Gardens by the Bay



8 Revolving Restaurant

9 Big wheel

10 Raffles Hotel

Drink a Singapore Sling in the hotel where it was created.

11 Botanic Gardens free


12  Swim outdoors - in a condo, Country or town club or public pool

Cashew Heights condo.


13 Visit synagogue - must book

14 Visit Toastmasters at Sheraton Hotel

Sheraton Hotel.

15 For photos pass Indian temple, Chinese temple

Indian temple. Toa Payoh South, next to Toa Payoh South Community Club..

16 Green Park hotel at Chinatown MRT

17 Chinatown

18 History Museum

19 Art Museum

20 Clarke Quay and Boat Quay river walk

22 MRT and LRT


23 Night Safari

24 Ford Factory Museum

25 Valu$ at Expo MRT.

26 St Andrews Cathedral, art museum and waterfront, view of Marina Bay Sands triple skyscraper with ininity pool on top, and statue of Raffles.




Pay to go up it to Observation deck, or pay for another deck where the cost is deducted from drinks and food.

28 Claim back Singapore's VAT if you spend more than 100

29 Kaya toast breakfast. Buy a jar to take home.






30 Hawker Centre meal. Chicken rice.


Then durian dessert or milkshake.

Or green pandan cake.



Websites
To learn Chinese

singaporeair.com
https://www.visitsingapore.com/travel-guide-tips/travelling-to-singapore/changi-airport-singapore/

About The Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

What is free or cheap in Singapore?

At the airport

Waterfall at Jewel mall, part of Changi airport.

Changi airport:
1 Free toilets.
2 Free water fountains.
3 Free view of waterfall at Jewel mall. Free sponsored sound and light show at intervals in the evening.(If the restaurants are too expensive for you, or you are in a hurry, look for the supermarkets in the basement.)
4 Free Butterfly Garden on two floors.
5 Several sculptures and some sculptures for Selfies.
6 Free bus tour if you are around in the city more than 5 hours.

Jewel waterfall at night.

Butterfly Garden. Changi Airport.

Community Clubs
You can recognize them by the imposing building, often on a corner, sometimes with a large clock tower.
In front will be a sign with the Malay word for club, Kelab.

Community Club at Tampines West, near the airport.

Inside will be an open sided sports area, often with team sports or martial arts lessons. Next to that in the centre, usually on the ground floor is a large sports hall or gym alos used for events. Usually a fast food restaurant such as McDonalds or KFC or a Chinese restaurant or hawker centre (food court).

Free toilets.
Open air space to sit. (No air con in public areas.)
Some Community Centres have a small pond containing large fish near the lift which will entrtain children and adults.

Often free newspapers and magazines to read, many Chinese and one or two in English, plus many public service leaflets.

Botanic Gardens
Free to walk in at both ends. One end is near the Botanic Gardens MRT undeground railway station.
Trees have plaques. Take a picnic or look for McDonalds. Food at all prices but long walks in between so plan your route and take water. The kiosks are cheaper than restaurants but some of the restaurants are expensive.

Free masks given out at many hospitals and health clinics to stop the spread of disease.

Gardens By The Bay
Outside the two giant paid for attractions is a garden of trees along the river. Numerous plaques about history, myths, and medicine and food and furniture using the trees.

MRT Underground Train Stations
Free wifi.
Free toilets at the station entrance - no need to buy a train ticket.

Many stations have sculptures or murals. Near Bencoolen is an art college.




Holland Village MRT station, Singapore. Mural showing windmill. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Daeso bargain store. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Cheap Shopping
1 Daeso Department store. Japanese. But many Chinese items. Convenient branches are by Expo MRT exit, or in the Ion Mall at Orchard MRT or in City Squre Mall by Farrer Park MRT.

2 Mustafas department store, covers two blocks, two floors and open 24 hours. Has everything from food and clothes to watches, luggage, curtains.

3 Bargain Basements in many shopping malls.
Bargain shops in out of the centre MRT station approach roads. For example, Toa Payoh. Also at the entrance to Expo MRT in the basement you find a Daeso and a Value store.

4 Supermarkets, Pharmacies & Convenience Stores
Fairprice supermarket.
Guardian Pharmacy. Cheap umbrellas.
Watsons Pharmacy. Cheap umbrellas.
7-11
Many branches in the malls by underground MRT train stations.

Cheap Eating
Food courts called Hawker centres are in the basement or on the top floor of many shopping malls and office blocks. Also look for hawker centres in markets, HDB (government housing estates), around MRT railway stations and in hospitals.

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Why You Should See Changi Airport in the Singapore Garden City

Changi Airport repeatedly wins awards and this year with the giant waterfall opened in 2019 it is better than ever.
Even if all you do is collect your suitcase you see flowers and greenery everywhere. Giant palm trees stand over the banks of luggage trolleys. Grennery is apparently on the walls. (In most buildings the inodor and outdoor greenery is on a frame a foot away from the wall for easy of access, watering and maintenance.)
Tubs of plants are along the moving walkways or travelators. Greenery is along the edges of the carousel carrying your suitcase.


Changi Airport Interior. Trolleys and palm trees. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Giant palm trees and a wall of greenery. High ceilings. Space. Abaundance of trolleys.

What to see:

The Waterfall In the Centre of Jewel Shopping Mall
Walk along indoors to Jewell Shopping mall. A giant waterfall about five storeys high. Actually it does down two basements. Feel the spray at the top amidst the greenery. Or dine beside it at the basement where it is encased in glass.



At night on the hour you can see a light and sound show on the waterfall. Free.

The waterfall in the centre of Jewel Shopping Mall, Changi airport, Singapore, at night.

Video by Angela Lansbury.

The Butterfly Garden
On two levels. A delight for children and adults. Huge butterlifes land beside you ready to be photographed on sliced tree trunk stumps, which I presume have some food to attract the butterlies, or are just a convenient flat resting place amid all the surrounding plants.

Butterfly Garden. Singapore's Changi Airport. Free.

On site hotel
Again an indoor walk through the airport to the hotel on one side of the elegant terminal. (Unlike the hotel at Warsaw where you have to drag your cases through a giant concrete floor car park.)

Sculptures.
Strategically placed statues are sccattered around with plaques explaining their significance.

Railway - The MRT
Walk through indoors and downstairs to the underground railway, called the MRT (Mass Rapid Transport). Only one stop away at Expo you find the station has two exits. One takes you to the Exhbititon centre. (Check out what's on.) the other exit is to a shopping mall. Right next to the exit are two bargain stores.

Daeso Bargains
The large supermarket style Daeso is a Japanese company where everything costs two dollars. nearby is another bargain basement store, value. I bought a cheap four wheel suitcases. they also sell hats and chocolate, toothpaste and lots more.

Singapore flags on sale near the checkout at Daeso, Japanese Department store ner Changi Airport, Singapore. Photo by Angela Lansbury. copyright.

Daeso. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Free Tour By Bus
If you have about five hours to spare in the daytime, and want a quick view of Singapore, you have time to queue up for the free two-hour bus tour and get back in time for your hour or two in advance check-in.

If you have several hours, take the train anyway. Several stations have attractive sculptures or murals reminding you where you are.

Free evening's entertainment:
Toastmasters Find-a-club.

Useful Websites
Singapore
visitsingapore.com

Singapore Airlines
Singapore.air.com

Airport

Wikipedia
Wikivoyage
Wikitravel
Tripadvisor

See other posts by Angela Lansbury on Singapore, learning Chinese (Mandarin) and more.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Singapore Airlines Voted Tops Again -Travel Via Singapore

Yes, Singapore Airlines is voted tops again. I have been a frequent flyer with them for years.

On board you can try out a Singapore sling. To compare with the ones at Raffles Hotel and elsewhere.

Singapore Sling.

Go where I go, direct to Singapore (from London, Heathrow) or to Australia with a stopover in Singapore on the way there and back.

Singapore flag.

Pair the airline with spacious but fun-packed Singapore's Changi Airport, which is the tops, also award-winning.

See the butterfly garden in one of the terminals.

A new adjacent shopping mall is opening next month called the Jewel.

As you drive from the airport, admire the colourful trees and flowers.

Colourful magenta bougainvillea planted in parks and over the bridges.

Add in

and the MRT and its railway station artwork.

Some history

Raffles statue.

Stations under shopping malls.

Off to Gardens By The Bay.

Take in some Indian temples by Little India. Shop in Mustafa's department store which is open 24 hours. Eat fish head curry served on green banana leaf  'plates'

Botanical Gardens MRT station, wall showing tree. Stroll around the free Botanical Gardens.

Then travel onwards or homewards though Changi again. See some great films on the airline.

Useful Websites

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-6873581/Singapore-Airlines-Jet2-com-Qatar-EVA-Emirates-pick-TripAdvisor-best-airline-awards.html

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have many more posts on Singapore. Please share links to your favourite posts.