Singapore - Labour Day & Changi Airport

By Rough Guy'd

Today was Labour day in Singapore and other than being a public holiday, the president’s house was opened up to the public. Of course this meant that my day was planned. Considering that Singapore is a small country and that land is at a premium, you wouldn’t expect anything big or fancy. Even taking into account that this was the president, I wasn’t expecting much, let alone an eighteen hole golf course, a massive mansion and lots of lovely garden to stroll through. The inside was furnished just as nicely as well with lots of impressive artworks scattered throughout his home as well as gifts from countries all over the world.

What trip to Singapore can be called complete without a day in the artificially-created resort of Sentosa Island. With a smattering of beaches, and right in the middle of a long weekend, I thought it would be busy and so I went with my cousin. Only enough, the place was a bit desolate and came across as a bit lonely with so much area and so little people. On the plus side, the lines for the rides were pretty short and we had a blast. We winded down the day with a movie, X-men origins: wolverine.

Sunday and the last day of Singapore before I head to Bali. I discovered that even though I wouldn’t be flying out until early Monday morning, the train service didn’t run that early in the morning and considering how far my cousin lived from the airport, it wouldn’t be worth it for a taxi so the plan was to take the late train Sunday night, arrive at the airport and take a quick nap before the flight. With the whole of Sunday to kill until my late night departure, I spent the day at the mall with my cousin before we went to join his friends for a night of revelry and karaoke, the classic Singaporean birthday party.

Interestingly enough, the trip to the airport that night at 11:30 was quite eventful as well. Though I had managed to catch the last train leaving from the station (only just), I found that the last transferring train to the airport had left ten minutes before I arrived and thus I did have to take a taxi anyway, though at a much shorter trip and cheaper fare. While trying to catch a taxi to the airport, I happened to notice some of the other passengers on the train and tried to see if any would be interested in sharing a cab. As it was, I did manage to meet up with a nice guy and we chatted for quite a fair bit before we carried on our conversation at a coffee house at the airport before going our separate ways.

Now if you thought all my worries were over now, I’ll be on hand to disappoint you. While Changi Airport is supposed to be one of the nicest airports in the world, there is a reason for that. Singapore handles a lot of passengers every day and as a result the airport can provide you with many amenities such as duty-free shops, shopping, eating even free internet and showers. Now, to provide this level of comfort and modernity, they upgrade the airport when they feel it is necessary. What this meant for me was that a late night nap before the flight was off the agenda as I had to fight against a backdrop of hammering, sawing and drilling. Roll on the morning...