After another early start I was ridiculously early to the airport in Siem Reap for a short flight to Singapore.
Relatively few people on the flight, maybe 40% full. Somehow I’d landed first row, 1F so was on and off ahead of the crowd.
Terminal 4 at Singapore’s Changi airport is designed for low-cost airlines but has the look of a modern, high-class terminal. Even something as mundane as the baggage retrieval conveyors are a nice place to be.
The other novelty on entering Singapore is that (having completed your pre-arrival information online) you can swan through an automated immigration gate, never having to be interrogated by border agents. The downside is that you don’t get a stamp in your passport.
The Jewel
A cursory glance at Changi airport’s website will quickly make obvious that it’s not just an airport, it’s a destination.
What this effectively means is that nestled between Terminals 1, 2 and 3 is a huge luxury shopping centre, and the centrepiece of the centre is the Rain Vortex. As “the world’s tallest indoor waterfall”, up to about 40,000 litres of water per minute fall from the glass ceiling to the basement level. It’s undeniably impressive, but not something I spent much more than 10 minutes gawking at.
What I actually found more compelling was the Forest Valley areas, where thousands of shrubs and trees climb terraces around the waterfall.
The rest of the affair is rather pedestrian, just a luxury mall wrapping the fancy waterfall and gardens, and a few pricey tourist attractions mainly aimed at kids.
The Hotel Indigo
Finding a half-decent, reasonably-priced hotel with a window is not easy in Singapore. Only through a clever combination of my employer’s corporate code and being an IHG member did I settle on the Hotel Indigo Singapore Katong. It’s really nice, and that membership thing got me a room upgrade, that looks out over the city from the floor-to-ceiling windows in the bathroom.
Gardens By The Bay
Another of Singapore’s top tourist attractions, I took a look in the evening after dinner. Again, there are paid attractions to visit, but wandering around is free and I was just in time for the twice a nightly “Garden Rhapsody” which was a medley of opera classics booming while the huge metal trees (designed as ventilation for other buildings) swim in LEDs. It’s ever so slightly on the wrong side of classy.
Still, there’s more to see there so I’ll try to get back in the daytime and have a proper mooch about.
