The Small Dot Down There

Recently, my family and I took a trip down to Singapore. My sis and I were excited mainly because we were:

• Going Universal Studios
• We have never in our life been to Singapore. Unless you count the few hours we were in the airport transiting to South Africa :P

No longer shall I join the ranks of Malaysians who have never been Singapore!

Anyway, here are a couple of things I noticed about Singapore.

1) It's clean
Like squeaky clean. I was outside some shopping mall sitting on the ground nearby the Merlion. I rubbed my hand on the floor and it wasn't even dirty. Also, you hardly see rubbish around. Very contrary to home. A good example would be the rubbish in the bushes I see on the way to church. The rubbish has been there for about a few months, I think. I only noticed it 2 months ago so it could have been there longer. The toilets were a breath of fresh air compared to the ones back home. SO CLEAN. Also, according to some residents, there are no rats.

Random quote: Me: There are more sheep in New Zealand than people
                        Sis: Just like there are more rats in KL than there are people.

2) Everywhere you go, you see cabs or buses
You can tell it's pretty easy to catch a cab here. And according to my dad's friends residing there if all the cars -excluding buses and cabs- were to stop suddenly, Singapore would still function like normal because the government has successfully developed the public transport to a point where you don't need a car in Singapore to get around. They also say it's safe. Which is also very contrary to the stories I hear of cabbies who don't use the meter, molest/rape female passengers and of people getting mugged at train stations.

Seeing as we're on the topic of safety, I like to point out that these same people also told me it's pretty safe to walk alone at night. And there are no snatch thieves.

3)There are trees everywhere
Considering the fact that Singapore is much MUCH smaller than Malaysia, I don't think they have the land space to have tropical rainforests. And so they compensate by having tons of trees at the side of the road. They have trees everywhere. Makes the place cool (:

4)I see real Christmas stuff
Seeing as Christmas is near, the decorations are up on Orchard Road! :D But I didn't just see beautiful lights, I saw a shopping mall that hung up a big sign with Ecclesiastes 3:11 on it- well part of it anyway.

'He has made all things beautiful in His time'

And yes, they did put the name of the verse too (: Also I came across some farm thingy and on the information board was the meaning of Christmas. And I saw all this stuff OUTSIDE a church. Religious freedom? I like.

5) Food is cheap
Black coffee, two pieces of toast and 2 half boiled eggs for just over 2 Singaporean dollars? I don't think food is even that cheap in Malaysia.

6) Cool T-shirts!I see people everywhere wearing T-shirts like:

or

WHY DOESN'T MALAYSIA HAVE THESE SHIRTS D:
I wanted to get some of these kind of shirts but unfortunately 1 Singapore Dollar is equivalent to RM 2.35. And so 1 shirt would cost over RM 30.

Honestly, Singapore would definitely be a place I wouldn't mind staying in. Except for one problem: it's not home D: However, I think Malaysia has a lot to learn from this country we call 'duri dalam daging'* in our textbooks. The place Malaysians laughed at when they separated saying they would come crawling back to us. Lee Kuan Yew, boy, did you show Malaysia.

And for that, you have my respect.

*a burden, trouble