Geylang, Singapore
Durian fruit. Click here for more photos from Singapore.
May 14-20, 2009
Thus far Singapore is the hottest, most humid country I have ever encountered (and as of this writing I've already been to Malaysia and Vietnam). Coming after cool autumnal Australia, the heat was brutal. The first couple days it almost felt like moving through water, the air was so heavy. We kept ducking into air-conditioned restaurants and shops just for some relief.
Since Singapore is essentially one huge shopping mall, luckily we were never far from a/c. A good Singaporean friend of mine from college used to joke about her country and its shopping centers, and she really wasn't kidding. It felt like everywhere we turned we found ourselves in another mall - gorgeous, gleaming, and frigidly blasted with a/c. And spotless, of course. Singapore is truly as clean as advertised. Not that we never saw litter, but all the sidewalks and pedestrian walkways were so well designed, all the public areas so beautifully laid out and maintained, an aura of glittering cleanliness seems to permanently hover over the city.
Our hostel, 98SG, was superbly located less than 100 feet from the Aljunied subway station, and it was wonderfully easy to get into the city center and explore. (I do so love a well-functioning metro system.) Aljunied serves the Geylang neighborhood, which my friend laughingly informed us was the red light district - after we'd already booked our hostel, of course. (I was rather startled to discover that Singapore has a red light district, with its wholesome, hardworking, no gum-chewing image - though with its history of pirates, this should really be no surprise.) Geylang turned out to be a great place to stay in - the hostel itself was located at the quiet end of a street, and the rest of the area is filled with Chinese and Taiwanese restaurants, brilliant red lanterns, and blazing neon signs.
We went out one evening with my friend E and a couple of her friends for a sampling of Taiwanese food. With rapid Mandarin they helped us order steamed and fried pork dumplings, bean curd custard, fried spring onion pancake, and yu tiao, the fried dough to be eaten with the custard. (As a former British colony, Singapore's primary language is English, though the island population is largely made up of ethnic Chinese, Indians and Maylay.) All was scrumptious except for the custard, which I found rather sour. Afterward we visited a fruit stand for durian. Durian is a large fruit - bigger than a coconut - studded with extraordinarily hard and sharp spikes. The fruit seller had to handle them with thick gloves, and we were informed that people have actually died when these fruits fall out of the trees and land on them. Harvesters have to wear helmets. I had no idea fruit could be so dangerous.
E. & friends enjoying their durian
Amusingly, the day before we had wondered over some signs on the bus: no smoking, no food or drink, no . . . strange spiky fruit? Why does it get its own category? Besides its prickliness durian is also known for its strong odor and unusual taste - which appeals to some and revolts others, apparently. Hence the ban on carrying them on public transportation. With swift whacks of the knife the fruit seller carved our durian into sections, of which only the spongy, yellow flesh around the pits is consumed. There's no doubt, durian is a strange fruit. Monica and I took tentative tastes . . . and promptly decided that was enough. It's the texture that's so off-putting - it reminded me of soft tuna fish more than anything else, except somehow sickly sweet. Not very appealing to American tastes. E and the others happily finished off every pit, however - and then washed their hands at the fruit stand's sink to get rid of the durian odor. I have never yet encountered another fruit that required so much effort to hide the fact that you had eaten it.Upon leaving the stand we were overjoyed to hear E and her friends complaining of the heat. "We thought it only affected us silly foreigners!" I said. "Oh, no!" said E's friend. "We're always hot! Why do you think we have so many indoor shopping malls?" Indeed. Singapore: where shopping - and air conditioning - reign supreme.
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