My week in Singapore, prior to New Year's

Happy New Year!
I've been having a grand old time in Singapore for the last week and have either been too tired or gone too much to write on my blog yet.
Here are some photos of my adventures from last week...

This was an art museum that I was able to tour for free because they offer free tours during the Christmas season. Yay!
The building was incredibly cool. I don't remember when it was built, but I do remember that it used to be a Catholic boys' school, back in the day.
(Down the street from the museum is another building that used to be a Catholic orphanage, but it's now a "strip mall" for expensive restaurants and bars. I think that's a bit sacrilegious, personally...)



See? Isn't it cool?


I think it'd be an ideal place to play Hide-and-Seek, because I really did get lost in it a few times.


These statues were outside the art museum. They represent how laborers used to eat in a rush, but now that these kind of laborers are becoming fewer and fewer, this kind of eating is a lost art. (That's what the plaque said, anyways.)

I also went to a place called Fort Canning. My dad would appreciate this place! It's mostly a historical garden to walk through, but it has some historical buildings to tour, too.

This was an underground fort, used during WW II. I think. You can read more detailed information here.

This small building used to be the headquarters for the head military people, whatever they're called. Now, it features multiple news clippings from history and a ticket counter for tours of the underground museum. I didn't go on this tour because it didn't interest me that much. (Sorry, no photos, Dad!)

A sally port, which is why I think playing Hide-and-Seek in Ft. Canning would be loads of fun!

Sally port explanation here

I thought this photo was pretty funny- a cannon aimed right for the skyscrapers.

Some subtle hints that I'm in the Arabic part of the city. :-P

(And, yes, I restrained myself from buying belly dancing and Ali Baba gear...)

Here's the biggest mosque in Singapore- the Sultan Mosque, or Masjid Sultan, in Bahasa. Its last reconstruction was in 1928.

I chose to take a tour of this mosque because

a.) it was free,

b.) I've never been in a mosque before, and

c.) it was along my walking route as I wandered through the city on Thursday.

When I entered, I had to put on a dark green, button-down robe because I'm a woman, even though I wasn't wearing anything scandalous. (Women aren't allowed to enter if they're dressed immodestly, like anything short or low-cut, which is not appropriate to wear in public, anyways, in my opinion.)

I was greeted by a tour guide, who was very enthusiastic to talk to me about Islam and the great things about the mosque. The tour wasn't much of a tour at all; all we did was walk in the foyer, where I took one photo. He wanted to show me the grave in the mosque of some sultan that died a hundred years ago, but I didn't think that was necessary.
For a better view of the outside of the mosque, you can click on this link.

(Random note: The golden dome on the top of the mosque is supported by soy sauce bottles! Haha!)

Here's the view inside the mosque. The rectangles on the floor indicate where people should kneel to pray. It can accommodate about 5,000 worshippers at a time.

Getting ready to learn about the Malaysian culture! (In reality, it's 97% the same as Indonesian culture, though.)

I went to a small Malaysian heritage museum on New Year's Eve, while Joy worked in the morning. I would have done a cultural activity and taken photos of it, but the museum wasn't doing any activities on account of it being a holiday. So I just took a few photos of the museum's surroundings.

This is a traditional Malaysian building structure, which is practically the same as a traditional Indonesian building structure. (I know this because I have a beautiful book at home that explains how Indonesian architecture and home decor has evolved over the past few hundreds of years.)

A traditional Malaysian fishing boat

This was a cute little shop where I rested my feet and drank a Ukranian coffee. (Although, it was amazingly delicious, and I'm not totally sure it's an authentic, Ukranian drink...)

More photos will follow in the next few days, during my last week of Singaporean life... *sniff sniff*