In Singapore there is a place called Orchard Road. It’s where you go to shop. From the Orchard Road website:
“22 Shopping Malls, 6 Departmental Stores. With close to 5,000 brands to choose from, Orchard Road is your ultimate shopping haven.”
And seriously, I have never seen anything like this place.
I started out the day by taking the transit system by myself over to Orchard Road where Kyle, a friend from Mudd, said that he would meet me. And despite the fact that it took a bus and two trains to get there, it was easy! Then I arrived and we were in a giant shopping mall. So we wandered up to a huge food court and he told me what everything was. When I say food court, it’s not like in the US where you have 5 or 6 options. We’re talking like 15 to 20. All different things, different specialties. He showed me the food he thought I would like and he was totally right. I’m actually kind of excited now because I have at least a vague idea of what is good to eat! And there was actually a quite shocking amount of American fast food if you were looking for it. So at least I know where I can get some if I need it!
We also stopped by a place called Toast Box for coffee and, you guessed it, toast! Which was super good! Kyle ordered Kaya Toast and shared it with me. They make it by toasting a thick piece of bread on a grill and the slicing it in half through the thickness. Then the spread Kaya, which is apparently coconut egg jam according to wikipedia, between the two pieces and put a strip of butter down the middle. It’s so delicious! But, my favorite part of toast box was definitely this butter tower.
Another thing that has apparently taken off in Singapore since Kyle left for college is cupcakes! Apparently there will just be random cupcake stalls in with all of the hawker stalls. These were in a kind of bakery section of one of the malls but they were so cute I had to take a picture! 😀
The malls themselves were nuts. The craziest one was all class and like swooping on the outside. It’s hard to describe. Just curves everywhere. Think the jelly bean thing in Chicago but giant and made of glass with a mall on the inside. Here’s a picture of an escalator with a cool swoopy, light up ceiling!
The malls just went on for ages. It was so intense. Like we would go into a mall, like this crazy huge like 8 story mall because it has two basements and be like wow, that’s a lot of shopping. And then you’d wander through and then keep wandering and then come up on the street somehow and realize you’re like 3 malls down from where you started because everything is connected underground! So, suffice it to say that I was hopelessly lost. But it was fun!
The number of stores and people was really incredible. The malls just seemed to go on forever and there was every type of store imaginable. Higher up there were the crazy expensive stores, Gucci, Armani, places that made custom clothes and shoes, and lower down there were more reasonable stores. Some were American but most of the stores I recognized were ones I knew from Australia rather than the US. Kyle said that many of the stores were from Europe rather than the US. There was also one really cool Japanese bookstore that was huge. I probably could have wandered there for hours.
You might be thinking, wow, with all of those malls, there’s no way that there aren’t just the same stores over and over again. And you’d be right. There are definitely repeats but it turns out that is a good thing! There are so many people that go to shop at Orchard Road that having multiple stores helps keep it somewhat sane in terms of crowds but it also helps when you can’t find your size at one store because you can always go to the next mall over and hopefully find it there! So it’s completely insane, but it kind of works.
I had a great day and it was really nice to just spend time with someone familiar. Thanks Kyle!
I also found out that an apartment I’m interested in is still available! It’s close to campus and I’m really hoping it will work out because I am so ready to unpack! Cross your fingers for me!