Singapore ArtScience

Though I only had a limited time in Singapore I was happy to take the days as they came. I loved not having to get up and not making any plans. The hostel provided a breakfast of toast and fruit until the middle of the afternoon so there was no hurry for me to get up and nowhere I needed to be.

My main impression of Singapore was that it’s a great place to visit if you want to shop. Everywhere I went there were shops and stalls and shopping centres. Even though I wasn’t too interested in shopping I was glad of the respite they provided from the high humidity of the city not to mention that where there are shops there is usually cake!

My first day in the city I started with a quick visit to china town but since I wasn’t looking to shop I had soon seen all I wanted to. I walked through the city until I reached the harbour where I enjoyed my first cake experience and used to free wifi to see what there was to do in the city other than shop. I discovered I was not far from the ArtScience museum, as a lover or both art and science I knew I had to visit. The building was an interesting shape which reminded me slightly of an American baseball glove. I later discovered that it was designed to look like an opening water lily and was a great feat of architecture, oops.

Inside I discovered there were two paid exhibitions and one floor that was free. Usually I’m all for the free but one of the exhibitions was for lego art and the other was an Egyptian mummy exhibit. I am interested in ancient Egypt but would have given it a miss as I have seen quite a few exhibits in the last three years. Fortunately I couldn’t resist the lego art exhibition and it wasn’t that much more expensive to go to them both so I though what the hell and bought my tickets.

I started with the mummies and was glad I had decided to give it a chance. Before the exhibit we were shown a short 3D film which was surprisingly rather good. The exhibit was well spaced out with the information on the exhibits interesting without being too overwhelming. They even had a room set up to explain the mummification process and I especially enjoyed finding out about the mummy who was mummified with a bowl on his head. The experts think that the bowl used to collect excess fluids was accidently left in place and got stuck over night. There are marls that showed attempts had been made to remove it indicating it was not meant to be there. I do hope the poor people who left it there were never found out as am sure their punishment would have been very harsh. I still find it creepy to think there are dead people inside all those and ages but I like seeing the everyday artefacts and learning about such a different culture.

The real highlight of my day was the lego art exhibit. I found myself looking at the and thinking that anyone could have done what the artist had done but that only he had the vision to see it. Though I’m not sure most people would have the patience as some of the pieces took him months to complete. As well as enjoying the art I found myself agreeing with his descriptions of his pieces and his inspiration. He too once had a proper job and gave it up to follow a love of something very different. I was amazed at his vision and the things he managed to portray with multicoulred bricks and nothing else.

 

After taking many photographs and placing Zack in various stupid places I decided it was time to head back to the hostel. Though I was happy to take it easy I thought that maybe I would try get up a little earlier the next day but my good intentions were foiled by the beautiful night skyline. I did my best to capture it with my small camera but soon realised I would have to return with my SLR another night.

Once back at the hostel it was time to start going through the many wedding photos to see if I had managed to get many decent shots. I was pleasantly surprised to find quite a few good ones but frustrated at how my lack of experience had messed up some including the first dance. Also I soon realised I had failed to get any of the groom with his parents. I that was one shot I the professional photographer had got so I knew they’d have some but I wished I had managed to get a few during the reception as well.