The Secret Garden

This morning marked a ceremonial day in my visit to Singapore.

Waking up early Sunday morning it soon dawned on me that not only would this be my last weekend spent in the country before returning home, but I was also about to lead my final session as a coach at English Soccer School.
Sadly, it won't be my last early morning in Singapore, but it will be my last one for work purposes!

Today I was working with one of the other coaches, Yoshi. Since my last blog I have moved locations. I was staying in an apartment in the vicinity of Sembawang, but for the last couple of days of my stay I have been 'upgraded' to stay in a condo (or the room of a condo) in a place called Yew Tee. When I first heard coaches discussing the location, I thought that 'UT' was short for something, not I realise it is actually phonetically spelt out!

I arrived here yesterday after bidding goodbye to my former room-mate Abdul who returned to England this morning, but will be kept company by a coach from Japan who is currently in the middle of a 'year-out' of work over in Singapore.

The condo had sort of become a mythical place, as having had it mentioned to me before, I had never actually had a chance to go there. Apart from being told there was a swimming pool and a gym, the details were rather limited. I mentioned in an earlier blog that after having coached in and around the vicinity of several condos I wouldn't have minded being placed in one for the duration of my visit, but in truth it doesn't quite live up to it's hype..... not in this setting anyway.

It is rather good that it does have a swimming pool (except for the fact I have no swimming shorts with me!) and there are other facilities available such as a tennis court and a basketball court, but we are treated to staying in a room within a condo apartment. The combined population of this location is nine, including one three month old baby, who is by far the dominant noise-maker.

The room I am staying in is actually smaller than the room in the apartment I was staying in before, and at least in there I was treated to a desk. In here my suitcase struggles to fit without blocking the door, and if I couldn't swing a cat in my former location then I doubt I'd even be able to fit a Siberian hamster in this place. I digress.....

Deciding that the surroundings aren't exactly idea I decided to spend most of yesterday afternoon out of the condo.
After coaching my last session in the morning, I came back to have a shower and then decided to head out into the city.

My flight leaves here early Wednesday morning meaning that I only have three full days left for exploration before departing. My experiences with sightseeing have been some what varied so I've decided to make the most of my time here now that I am no longer committed to working!

For today I decided to head to the Botanic Gardens of Singapore which is not to far away from the city centre. I find Singapore can be very strange in that way. The imagine that you get of the country is that there are plenty of skyscrapers across the city centre, but then there is also somewhere like the Botanic Gardens park not too far away, it is quite a contrast.

Botanic Gardens has it's own stop on the 'circle line' of the MRT map, and from Yew Tee it requires a few changes to be able to get there. It eventually took me about 45 minutes before arriving, and thankfully the gardens are pretty much just around the corner from where you exit the rail system.

I took plenty of time to study the map, but it seemed to be a few windey inter-connected paths that guide you through, and eventually back around to the beginning. The Garden itself has several sections including a number of sub-gardens and also an orchid garden - the only thing you actually have to pay to see. I walked through the area for about an hour and a half stopping at everything there was to see. These mostly included oddly-shaped trees or brightly coloured flowers.

I did get a rather big surprise when taking my time to stop however though as a bee the size of a small bird flew in my direction. I figured this was not the time to break by duck of having never been stung by a bee!!!

There were some interesting noises developing all around me as you could hear crickets, grasshoppers and various other bugs and creatures humming as you circulated the plant and tree filled paths of the garden. At one point I did see a sign that there had been sightings of monitor lizards in the area, but sadly I didn't manage to catch a glance of any on my visit. Down by a pond I did however catch sight of a few turtles that were swimming around among some fish, but nothing more exciting than that.

After getting to the opposite end of the park I decided against turning round and going back, and instead continued on walking towards the famous Orchard Road area of Singapore which I saw signposted as being relatively close.

My only experiences of Orchard have been go stop off there to catch the bus on the way to a school, but this is the location that houses most of the shopping malls and high priced luxury housing in the country. I decided to visit a couple of shopping locations, and was not only astounded by the sheers size, and number of shops, but also how many people were in them to say it was a Sunday evening.

Spent some time mainly window-shopping in places I won't be able to afford to purchase things from anytime soon, and following that I carried on walking, first looking for a crossing point back to the MRT, and then just out of curiosity. It seems like the shops here go on endlessly, and it's a far stretch from the places I have been staying.

This is more of what Singapore is known for, and I can honestly say that I have never seen anything like it before in my life. It reminds me how incredibly lucky I am to be able to visit a country that is as diverse as Singapore.

I headed home at about 7pm just as the sun was setting on another day in the Lion City.

The spell was broken. My uncle learned to laugh, and I learned to cry. The secret garden is always open now. Open, and awake, and alive. If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.