Shopping in Singapore

If there is one thing that I read about Singaporeans, they love shopping and eating—which works out great for me because I love to engage in both of these activities. The first thing we did after leaving Church was eat. As I previously mentioned, we left Malaysia with no money and Yale only got enough money for us to make it to our place on Saturday. We skipped lunch on Saturday and breakfast on Sunday. Needless to say, I had the tiger in me (inside joke, sorry to those of you who don't get it). We walked from the Church down to Orchard Road, an area of town known for extravagant shopping. We found a Tex-Mex grill, so we stopped in for a delicious and inexpensive meal. For S$20, I ate soup and Antonio (pork) chops, had some strawberry ice cream for dessert, and had a refillable soft drink. I'm glad that refillable means unlimited refills in Singapore. In KL, refillable means one free refill. I had to pay for another soda because I thought it was unlimited (the waiter neglected to mention this to me).

Orchard Road really does live up to its name. It's a street lined with nice malls on both sides of the street. What's so impressive is that the shops continue for about ½ mile. Mall after mall after mall...And there are plenty of restaurants in the area. You can spend a whole day here eating and shopping. All in all, I think I spent about 5 hours on this one street. I picked up a tee at Zara's and I almost bought a pair of shoes at Diesel. They didn't have any socks that I could borrow, so I'm going to go back on Monday or Tuesday. Oh yeah, I also kinda, sorta bought a custom suit.

I had no plans on buying one; Yale even asked me if I wanted to buy one in HK and I told him no. But then the Indian fellow lured me in with a "suits from S$180" sign, so I had to see what he was offering. Of course, the first fabric that I look at costs S$380 (blend of wool and cashmere, or so he says). For that much, I could buy a suit from Banana Republic back in the US, a brand that I love and trust. I eventually caved when he lowered the price to S$300 (about US$200). I also picked up a pair of dress shirts for about US$40 (a shirt). So, we'll see if I like what I bought. It was really hard for me to look at a small piece of fabric and envision a great looking suit or shirt. If anything, it's a learning experience. It would have been easier if I had a girl with me to get some feedback.

I was surprised to learn that you can haggle on Orchard Road (only in the electronics shops). I was looking for a headset that I could use with Skype. The hostels in Japan had ones that I could borrow, but from KL on out, I figured I'd need to have my own pair. It's comes in handy for chatting with the fam and with Diane. I'm halfway across the world, but it's great to be able to get on my laptop and call home for only a few cents per minute.