Brief history

Little is known of Singapore’s ancient history. Third-century Chinese sailors could have been referring to the place in their account of Pu-Luo-Chung, or “island at the end of a peninsula”. In the late thirteenth century, Marco Polo reported seeing a place called Chiamassie, which could also have been Singapore; by then the island was known locally as Temasek and was a minor trading outpost of the Sumatran Srivijaya Empire.

Throughout the fourteenth century, Singapura felt the squeeze as the Ayuthaya and Majapahit empires of Thailand and Java struggled for control of the Malay Peninsula. Around 1390, a Sumatran prince called Paramesvara threw off his allegiance to Majapahit and fled to Temasek. There he murdered his host and ruled the island until a Javanese offensive forced him further north, where he and his son, Iskandar Shah, subsequently founded the Melaka Sultanate.

The country’s present name is derived from one first recorded in the sixteenth century, when a legend recounted in the Sejarah Melayu (Malay Annals) told of how a Sumatran prince saw what he thought was a lion while sheltering on the island from a storm. He then founded a city here and named it Singapura, Sanskrit for “Lion City”.

The British colony takes shape

By the late eighteenth century, with China opening up for trade with the West, the British East India Company felt the need to establish outposts along the Straits of Melaka. Enter Thomas Stamford Raffles, lieutenant-governor of Bencoolen in Sumatra. In 1819, he alighted on the north bank of the Singapore River accompanied by William Farquhar, former Resident of Melaka. Raffles quickly saw the potential of what was then an inconsequential fishing island to provide a deep-water harbour and struck a deal to establish a British trading station with Abdul Rahman, the temenggong (chieftain) of Singapore and a subordinate of the Sultan of Johor. The Dutch, however, were furious at this British incursion into what they considered their territory. Realizing that the pro-Dutch sultan would not implement the deal, Raffles simply recognized the sultan’s brother, Hussein, as the new ruler, then concluded a second treaty with both Hussein and the temenggong. The Union Jack was raised, and Singapore’s future as a trading post was set.

As early as 1822, Raffles set about drawing up the demarcation lines which can still be perceived in the layout of modern Singapore. The area south of the Singapore River was earmarked for Chinese migrants; Muslims were settled around the sultan’s palace in today’s Arab Street area. In 1824, Hussein and the temenggong were bought out, and Singapore was ceded outright to the British. Three years later, the new port was united with Penang and Melaka to form the Straits Settlements, which became a British Crown Colony in 1867.

Singapore consolidates

Thanks to its strategic position at the gateway to the South China Sea, Singapore grew meteorically. By 1860 it had eighty thousand inhabitants; Arabs, Indians, Javanese and Bugis all settled here, but most numerous of all were southern Chinese. The opening of the Suez Canal and advent of the steamship consolidated the island’s position, a status further enhanced as the British drew all of the Malay Peninsula into their clutches, allowing Singapore to profit from its hinterland’s tin- and rubber-based economy.

By the 1920s, Singapore’s communities were starting to find their voice: in 1926, the Singapore Malay Union was established; as was the Malayan Communist Party four years later, largely backed by local Chinese. But rumblings concerning greater self-rule were barely audible when an altogether more immediate problem reared its head.

World War II

In December 1941, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour and invaded the Malay Peninsula; less than two months later they were at the Causeway between Johor and Singapore. On February 15, 1942, the fall of Singapore was complete. Winston Churchill called the surrender “the worst disaster and the largest capitulation in British history”. Three and a half years of brutal Japanese rule ensued, during which upwards of 25,000 Chinese men were shot dead at Punggol and Changi beaches as enemies of the Japanese, and Europeans were either herded into Changi Prison or marched up the Peninsula to work on Thailand’s infamous “Death Railway”.

Independence

After the war, Singaporeans demanded a say in the island’s administration, and in 1957 the British agreed to an elected legislative assembly. Full internal self-government was achieved in 1959, when the People’s Action Party (PAP) emerged on top in elections. Cambridge law graduate Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s first prime minister, quickly sought security via a merger with newly independent Malaya (now Peninsular Malaysia). In 1963 Singapore joined with Malaya, Sarawak and British North Borneo (Sabah) to form the Federation of Malaysia, but within two years it was asked to leave. Things looked bleak for the tiny island. But Lee’s personal vision and drive transformed Singapore into an Asian economic heavyweight, and enabled his party to utterly dominate Singapore politics to this day. Much of the media was taken under the state’s wing and opposition politicians were harassed through the courts or even detained without trial.

New leaders, new maturity

Goh Chok Tong became prime minister in 1990 upon Lee’s retirement – though many felt that Lee still called the shots. In 2004, Goh was succeeded by Lee Hsien Loong, Lee Kuan Yew’s son, and on the very same day the elder Lee was named “minister mentor”, a new position that gave him an official high horse from which to influence affairs. However, while the younger Lee has a sternness reminiscent of his father, Singapore was already becoming less uptight before his tenure, with a more open stance towards artistic expression and gay issues, for example, and the trend has continued. Perhaps the most startling expression of this maturing character came in the 2011 polls, when the opposition won nearly forty percent of the popular vote and six out of 87 elected parliamentary seats – its best showing ever.

Although the PAP rebounded in the 2015 polls – held soon after the republic’s golden jubilee and the death of Lee Kuan Yew – it seems clear that Singapore is capable of greater critical thinking than its media would suggest. Issues that continue to rankle include rising healthcare and housing costs, and the PAP’s open stance on immigration – foreign workers on short-term contracts make up a quarter of the population.

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Downtown Singapore

Taking up the southern part of the diamond-shaped main island, downtown Singapore is essentially the historic city centre. Although it’s easy to navigate, given the excellent transport network, individual districts are best explored on foot. You need two days to do justice to the main areas, namely the Colonial District, Chinatown, Little India and the Arab Quarter, although you could just about squeeze in a trip to Marina Bay Sands too, or go shopping in Orchard Road.

The Colonial District

On the north bank of the Singapore River is what might be termed the Colonial District – although locals might refer to it as the Civic District or use the names of landmarks, notably the Padang. This rectangular green expanse is flanked by dignified reminders of British rule, including the erstwhile Parliament House and City Hall; the surrounding area has a viable claim to be the island’s museum quarter. The river itself was once the epicentre of Singapore’s trade boom, although trendy nightspots now occupy its old warehouses. Come in September, and you’ll see crash barriers and fences sprouting in both the Colonial District and Marina Centre next door, as main roads are transformed into the racetrack of Singapore’s night-time Formula One Grand Prix.

The Padang

City Hall, Esplanade or Raffles Place MRT

The Padang, earmarked by Stamford Raffles as a recreation ground shortly after his arrival, is the very essence of colonial Singapore. In many respects it remains much as it was in 1907, when G.M. Reith wrote in his Handbook to Singapore: “Cricket, tennis, hockey, football and bowls are played on the plain…beyond the carriage drive on the other side is a strip of green along the sea-wall, with a foot-path which affords a cool and pleasant walk in the early morning and afternoon”. Once the last over of the day had been bowled, the Padang assumed a more social role: Singapore’s European community would hasten to the corner once known as Scandal Point to catch up on gossip.

The brown-tiled roof, whitewashed walls and green blinds of the Singapore Cricket Club, at the southwestern end of the Padang, have a nostalgic charm. Founded in the 1850s, the club was the hub of colonial British society and still operates a “members only” rule. (Eurasians, formerly ineligible for membership due to the prejudices of the time, founded their own establishment in 1883: the Singapore Recreation Club, at the opposite end of the Padang.)

National Gallery

St Andrew’s Rd (main entrance Coleman St) • Mon–Thurs & Sun 10am–7pm, Fri & Sat 10am–10pm • S$20 • 6271 7000, nationalgallery.sg • City Hall or Raffles Place MRT

Taking up the entire west side of the Padang, Singapore’s prestigious new National Gallery is redolent with history, formed as it is out of two of the island’s most imposing colonial buildings. On the right as seen from the Padang is City Hall, with steps backed by grandiose Corinthian columns; it was here that Louis Mountbatten, supreme allied commander in Southeast Asia, announced Japan’s surrender in 1945. Fourteen years later, Lee Kuan Yew chose the same spot for his address at a victory rally celebrating self-government for Singapore. On the left, the domed former Supreme Court was built in Neoclassical style in the 1930s and served its judicial functions until 2006.

DBS Singapore Gallery

Housed inside the erstwhile City Hall is the three-roomed DBS Singapore Gallery, which showcases work by artists who were either born in Singapore or lived here for a time. There’s a notable emphasis on the Nanyang style (nanyang being the Mandarin term for the South China Sea), an umbrella term for art featuring a fusion of Western and Chinese techniques. One exemplar is Georgette Chen, whose elegant Lotus in a Breeze bears the hallmarks of Neo-impressionism, yet was only painted in 1970. Look out also for Chua Mia Tee’s Epic Poem of Malaya and Tan Tee Chie’s On Strike, both stirring depictions of the restive 1950s and yearnings for independence, and Tan Choh Tee’s 1981 Singapore River, proof – if any were needed – that today’s river is but a shadow of its former fetid self.

UOB Southeast Asia Gallery

At the opposite end of the National Gallery, former courtrooms now house the UOB Southeast Asia Gallery, which attempts to put a hotchpotch of modern, often conceptual, art from the region into some kind of context. Although the exhibits may not grab you, the architecture probably will: this is the most lovingly conserved part of the National Gallery, retaining its original black-and-white marbled floors and wooden ceilings; an internal domed rotunda still houses a collection of legal books.

The roof garden

It’s worth heading up to the National Gallery’s roof garden for a fine panorama out over the Padang, with Marina Bay Sands directly opposite; you can even peer down to City Hall’s foyer through the glass-floored decorative pools. Turn around and face west to take in the flying-saucer-like crown of the Norman Foster-designed New Supreme Court on North Bridge Road, which opened in 2006.

The parliament buildings

Old Parliament House 1 Old Parliament Lane • Daily 10am–10pm • 6332 6900, theartshouse.sg • New Parliament House 1 Parliament Place • parliament.gov.sg • Raffles Place or City Hall MRT

Probably the island’s oldest surviving building, the Old Parliament House was built in 1827 as the home of a rich merchant, with Singapore’s pre-eminent colonial architect, the Irishman George Drumgoole Coleman, as its creator. The bronze elephant at the front was a gift to Singapore from King Rama V of Thailand (upon whose father The King and I was based) after his visit in 1871. Relieved of its legislative role in 1999, the building now holds a contemporary arts centre called The Arts House. Backing onto it and facing North Bridge Road is the rather soulless new Parliament House, where parliamentary business is now conducted.

Victoria Concert Hall and Victoria Theatre

11 Empress Place • 6908 8810, vtvch.com • Raffles Place or City Hall MRT

Opposite the Singapore Cricket Club are two more fine examples of colonial architecture, the Victoria Theatre and, to the right, the Victoria Concert Hall (also called the Victoria Memorial Hall). The former was completed in 1862 as Singapore’s town hall, while the concert hall was added in 1905; both now boast extensive glass panelling after a recent refit.

During the Japanese occupation, the concert hall’s clock tower was altered to Tokyo time, while the statue of Raffles that stands in front of it narrowly escaped being melted down. It was sent to the National Museum, where the newly installed Japanese curator valued it enough to hide it instead of destroying it. A copy can be seen staring towards the Financial District at Raffles’ landing site, where the great man apparently took his first steps on Singaporean soil in January 1819.

Sir Stamford Raffles

Fittingly for a man who was to spend his life roaming the globe, Thomas Stamford Raffles was born at sea on July 6, 1781, aboard the Ann, whose master was his father Captain Benjamin Raffles. By the age of 14, the young Raffles was working as a clerk for the East India Company in London, his schooling curtailed because of his father’s debts. Even then, Raffles’ ambition and self-motivation were evident: he studied through the night with a hunger for knowledge that would spur him to learn Malay, amass a collection of natural history treasures and write his two-volume History of Java.

In 1805 he was chosen to join a team going out to Penang, then being developed as a British entrepôt. Once in Southeast Asia, he enjoyed a meteoric rise and by 1807 he was named chief secretary to Penang’s governor. In 1810, Raffles was appointed secretary to the Governor-General in Malaya, then governor of Java in 1811. Raffles’ rule there was libertarian and compassionate, but short-lived – to his chagrin, Java was handed back to the Dutch in 1816. Transferred to the governorship of Bencoolen in Sumatra, he arrived there in 1818 and found time to study its flora and fauna, including the incredible Rafflesia arnoldii. By this time, Raffles strongly believed that Britain should establish another base in the Straits of Melaka. In 1819 he sailed to the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, where he secured Singapore early that year in the face of local and Dutch opposition.

For a man inextricably linked with Singapore, Raffles spent remarkably little time there. His last visit was in 1822; by August 1824, he was back in England. Hoping for a pension from the East India Company, he busied himself founding London Zoo and setting up a farm in what is now northwest London. But the new life he had planned never materialized, as days after he heard that the Calcutta bank holding his savings had folded, his pension application was refused; worse still, the Company was demanding he return an overpayment of £22,000. Then on July 4, 1826, the brain tumour that had caused him headaches for several years took his life. He was initially buried with no memorial tablet; only in 1832 was Raffles commemorated, by a statue in Westminster Abbey.

Asian Civilizations Museum

1 Empress Place, north side of Cavenagh Bridge • Mon–Thurs & Sat 10am–7pm, Fri 10am–9pm • S$8; Fri after 7pm S$4 • 6332 7798, acm.org.sg • Raffles Place or City Hall MRT

A robust Neoclassical structure, the Empress Place Building was named after Queen Victoria and completed in 1865. Once government offices, it now houses the fine Asian Civilizations Museum, tracing the origins and growth of Asia’s many cultures.

The museum’s glassy new riverside extension is also its highlight, housing the Tang Shipwreck Gallery, a dazzling trove of ninth-century Chinese goods controversially salvaged from a sunken Arab dhow discovered off the coast of Sumatra in 1998 (a recreation of the ship can be seen at Sentosa’s Maritime Experiential Museum). There’s a profusion of ceramic bowls, but the few specimens of gold and silverware are the most memorable: cups, dishes decorated with swastikas or birds, and flasks for wine. Upstairs in the main building is an assortment of artefacts, including Muslim gravestones, Sumatran lacquerware and some fine examples of ikat dyed textiles from Borneo.

The Singapore River

Little more than a creek, in the nineteenth century the Singapore River became the main artery of Singapore’s growing trade, and was clogged with bumboats – houseboat-sized vessels with eyes painted on their prows. The boat ferried coffee, sugar and rice to warehouses called godowns, where coolies loaded and unloaded sacks. In the 1880s the river itself was so busy it was practically possible to walk from one side to the other without getting your feet wet. Of course, bridges were built across it as well, most endearingly old-fangled to look at now, apart from the massive new Esplanade Bridge at the river’s mouth.

Walking beside the river today, all sanitized and lined with trendy restaurants and bars, some occupying the few surviving godowns, it is hard to imagine that in the 1970s this was still a working river. It was also filthy, occasioning a massive clean-up campaign that moved the river’s commercial traffic west to Pasir Panjang within the space of a few years; it contributed to the river’s current status as one of the leading nightlife centres of Singapore.

River tours

You can get a view of the city at river level on the Singapore River Experience, trips taking in Clarke Quay, Boat Quay and Marina Bay in souped-up versions of bumboats (daily 9am–10.30pm; 3–4 hourly; 40min; buy tickets and board at any of several ticket booths along the route; 6336 6111, rivercruise.com.sg). Tickets cost S$25 except for the 7.30pm and 8.30pm sailings, which cost S$38 and take in the laser light show at Marina Bay. More prosaically and much more cheaply, it’s also possible to ride the company’s river taxi service, although you will need an ez-link card for this.

Cavenagh Bridge

Raffles Place or City Hall MRT

Cavenagh Bridge, with its elegant suspension struts, is one of the Singapore River’s antiquated bridges, linking the Padang with Boat Quay and Raffles Place in the Financial District. Named after Major General Orfeur Cavenagh, governor of the Straits Settlements from 1859 to 1867, it was built in 1869 by Indian convict labourers using imported Glasgow steel. A sign still maintains: “The use of this bridge is prohibited to any vehicle of which the laden weight exceeds 3cwt and to all cattle and horses” – which is just as well, as nowadays the bridge takes only pedestrians.

St Andrew’s Cathedral

11 St Andrew’s Rd; Visitor Centre on North Bridge Rd • Mon–Sat 9am–5pm; tours Mon, Tues & Thurs 10.30am, Wed & Fri 3.30pm (20min; free) • 6337 6104, cathedral.org.sg • City Hall or Esplanade MRT

The Anglican St Andrew’s Cathedral is the most distinguished of a clutch of nineteenth-century churches north of the Padang, their steeples dwarfed by most buildings around them. Built in high-vaulted Neo-Gothic style using Indian convict labour, it was consecrated on January 25, 1862. The exterior walls were plastered using Madras chunam – an unlikely composite of eggs, lime, sugar and shredded coconut husks which shines brightly when smoothed – while the small cross behind the pulpit was crafted from two fourteenth-century nails salvaged from the ruins of England’s Coventry Cathedral after it was razed during World War II. The middle stained-glass window in the nave was dedicated to Raffles in the 1960s and bears his coat of arms.

CHIJMES

30 Victoria St • chijmes.com.sg • City Hall, Bras Basah or Esplanade MRT

Two venerable Catholic institutions lie almost immediately north of St Andrew’s Cathedral, although one of them no longer serves its original purpose. What was the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus is now a complex of bars and restaurants named CHIJMES (pronounced “chimes”). Its Neo-Gothic husk, complete with courtyards, fountains and a sunken forecourt, appeals particularly to expats and tourists, although it still irks some locals that planners allowed a historic convent school to be repurposed like this. Look out for the Gate of Hope on its Victoria Street flank, where foundlings were once taken in by the nuns.

Cathedral of the Good Shepherd

Corner of Queen St and Bras Basah Rd • Mon–Fri 8am–9pm, Sat & Sun 7am–9pm • 6337 2036, cathedral.catholic.sg

Opened on June 6, 1847, the Cathedral of the Good Shepherd is more modest in scale than its Anglican rival and yet more refined. Neoclassically styled, the building has regained its lovely chequerboard flooring and white, cream and gold colour scheme, thanks to restoration works that cost S$40 million. Upstairs, the 1912 organ is similarly immaculate, having been completely overhauled by specialists from the Philippines.

War Memorial

Esplanade or City Hall MRT

The open plot north of the Padang is home to four 70m-high white columns. They are nicknamed “the chopsticks” but are actually the Civilian War Memorial, commemorating those who died during the Japanese occupation. Beneath it are bodily remains, reinterred from unmarked wartime graves around the island.

Church of St Gregory the Illuminator

60 Hill St • Daily 9am–6pm • armeniansinasia.org • City Hall or Bras Basah MRT

A couple of blocks west of the Padang, Hill Street holds one of the most delightfully intimate buildings in downtown Singapore. The Armenian Church of St Gregory the Illuminator was designed by George Drumgoole Coleman and completed in 1835. The white circular interior, fronted by a marble altar and a painting of the Last Supper, includes a framed photo of the few dozen Armenians who lived in Singapore in 1917, for whom the tiny church would have been room enough. Among the handful of graves in the tranquil garden is the tombstone of Agnes Joaquim – a nineteenth-century Armenian resident of Singapore – after whom the national flower, the delicate, purple Vanda Miss Joaquim orchid, is named; she discovered it in her garden and had it registered at the Botanic Gardens.

Central Fire Station

Junction of Coleman and Hill streets • Galleries Tues–Sun 10am–5pm • Free • 6332 2996 • City Hall or Bras Basah MRT

The splendid red-and-white-striped Central Fire Station, built in 1908, sports a central watchtower that was once the tallest structure in the area, a perfect vantage point for spotting blazes early. Today it’s partly given over to the Civil Defence Heritage Galleries, tracing the history of firefighting in Singapore. Of more interest than the displays – restored vintage fire engines and the like – are the accounts of historic fires in Singapore. At Bukit Ho Swee, in 1961, a blaze ripped through a district of atap huts and timber yards, destroying sixteen thousand homes. The disaster led directly to a public housing scheme that would ultimately spawn the island’s numerous new towns.

Freemasons’ Hall

23A Coleman St, directly behind the Central Fire Station • City Hall or Bras Basah MRT

Recently given a fresh lick of paint, Singapore’s compact Freemasons’ Hall features a proud Palladian facade bearing the masonic compass-and-square motif. The building dates from the 1870s and remains in use. It’s worth noting that Stamford Raffles himself was apparently a mason.

Peranakan Museum

39 Armenian St, just west of Hill St • Mon–Thurs & Sat 10am–7pm, Fri 10am–9pm • S$10; Fri after 7pm S$5 • 6332 7591, peranakanmuseum.org.sg • City Hall or Bras Basah MRT

A beautifully ornamented three-storey building that started out in 1910 as the Tao Nan School – Singapore’s first school to cater for new arrivals from China’s Fujian province – now houses the Peranakan Museum. It honours a culture which, in its own way, is to Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia what Creole culture is to Louisiana. The museum should whet your appetite for not only the Baba House but also the Peranakan heritage of the Katong area.

The diversity of the Peranakans comes through in the first gallery, which includes video interviews with members of Melaka’s small Chitty community, a blend of Tamil, Chinese and Malay. Thereafter the galleries concentrate on the Baba-Nyonyas, the Peranakans of Singapore, exploring their possessions – theirs was always largely a material culture – and customs, in particular the traditional twelve-day wedding. Memorable displays include the classic entrance into a Peranakan home: a pair of pintu pagar (tall swing doors), overhung with lanterns; look out also for artefacts such as beautiful repoussé silverware, including “pillow ends”, coaster-like objects used for some reason as end-caps for bolsters.

National Museum of Singapore

93 Stamford Rd • Daily 10am–7pm • S$15 • 6332 3659, nationalmuseum.sg • Bras Basah, Dhoby Ghaut or City Hall MRT

An eye-catching dome on Stamford Road, seemingly coated with silvery fish scales, marks the National Museum of Singapore. The museum has been revamped twice this century, most recently to tie in with the island’s 50th anniversary of independence celebrations in 2015, and the results are a mixed bag. A lack of significant artefacts is always going to be an issue for such a young country, but the main issue is a lack of academic weight – its scale aside, this feels more like a provincial museum with a parochial mindset.

Level 1

Almost the entire lower level of the museum is taken up by the Singapore History Gallery. Look out early on for the mysterious Singapore Stone, all that survives of an inscribed monolith which once stood near where the Fullerton hotel is today, though more memorable is the beautiful gold jewellery excavated at Fort Canning in 1928 and thought to date from the fourteenth century. With the colonial era come portraits of Stamford Raffles, his sidekicks and later officials, most notably one of Frank Swettenham, governor of the Straits Settlements in the 1900s, by the American artist John Singer Sargent. There’s also a look at the lives of colonial housewives, including an amusing Malay phrasebook for transacting with servants, with phrases such as “I want to inspect the kitchen to-day” and “This meat is tainted!”.

A replica Japanese tank heralds what’s perhaps the most interesting section for foreigners, dealing with the British collapse during World War II, and the massacres of Operation Sook Ching. Also interesting are the displays on postwar politics, including the abortive marriage with Malaysia. From today’s perspective it seems hard to believe that up until around the early 1970s, much was still up for grabs in Singapore politics, and the museum deserves credit for devoting space to former opposition figures.

Level 2

Upstairs are four galleries of varying quality; the best is the Modern Colony Gallery, kitted out in Art Deco style to explore the prosperous Singapore of the 1920s. Also worth a look is Desire and Danger, a gallery featuring flora and fauna artworks famously commissioned by William Farquhar – one or two are also on display at the National Gallery – with a few biological specimens on show and even odour-dispensing jars for an even more back-to-nature experience.

Fort Canning Park

Numerous entrances, including steps on Hill St or via the back of the National Museum • Fort Canning, Bras Basah, Dhoby Ghaut or Clarke Quay MRT

When Raffles first caught sight of Singapore, Fort Canning Park was known as Bukit Larangan (Forbidden Hill). Malay annals tell of the five ancient sultans of Singapura who ruled the island from this site, and unearthed artefacts prove it was inhabited as early as the fourteenth century. The last of the sultans, Iskandar Shah, reputedly lies here, and it was out of respect for – and fear of – his spirit that the Malays decreed the hill forbidden. Singapore’s first Resident, William Farquhar, displayed typical colonial tact by promptly erecting a bungalow on the summit. It was replaced in 1859 by a fort named after Viscount George Canning, Governor-General of India, but only a gateway, guardhouse and adjoining wall remain today. The surprisingly grand building up the slope from the National Museum is the Fort Canning Centre, a former British barracks that has hosted arts bodies in the past, although it was disused at the time of research.

Battle Box

Cox Terrace • Compulsory tours Mon 1–5pm, Tues–Sun 9am–5pm; 1hr (schedules online) • S$15 • 6338 6133, battlebox.com.sg

On the right of the Fort Canning Centre, a path leads to the 1939 bunkers from which the Allied war effort in Singapore was masterminded. Now restored and called the Battle Box, it holds dioramas bringing to life the events leading up to the British surrender in February 1942.

Raffles Terrace

South side of Fort Canning Park

Just left of the Fort Canning Centre, there is a keramat (auspicious place) on the supposed site of Iskandar Shah’s grave, which attracts a trickle of local Muslims. Continue round the hill and you’ll meet the staircase from Hill Street at Raffles Terrace, where there are replicas of a colonial flagstaff and a lighthouse – the hill was the site of a working lighthouse that functioned up until the middle of the last century.

Along River Valley Road

Fort Canning Park’s southern boundary is defined by River Valley Road, which skirts below the park from Hill Street. At the corner with Hill Street is the MICA Building, with shuttered windows in bright colours. Formerly the Hill Street Police Station, it is now home to two government ministries, and its central atrium houses several galleries majoring in Asian artworks.

G-MAX and GX5

Daily 2pm–late • Each ride S$45 • 6338 1766, gmaxgx5.sg • Clarke Quay or Fort Canning MRT

Close to the Coleman Bridge is G-MAX, billed as a “reverse bungy jump” though it’s really more like a metal cage suspended from steel cables, allowing several screaming passengers to be tossed around in the air. Neither it nor the GX5 “extreme swing” on the same site are best sampled if you’ve already indulged at one of the many bars and restaurants nearby.

Clarke Quay

3 River Valley Rd • clarkequay.com.sg • Clarke Quay or Fort Canning MRT

Painted in gaudy colours and housing flashy eating and nightlife venues, the nineteenth-century godowns of Clarke Quay feel about as authentic as the translucent plastic canopy that shelters them; nearby Boat Quay feels homelier even when at its busiest. Further up River Valley Road is Robertson Quay, offering more of the same although generally quieter.

Chettiar Temple

15 Tank Rd • Daily 8.30am–12.30pm & 5.30–8.30pm • Free • 6737 9393, sttemple.com • Fort Canning or Dhoby Ghaut MRT, or bus #143 from Orchard Rd or Chinatown

Just west of Fort Canning Park and close to Robertson Quay is what is still often known as the Chettiar Temple (its official name being the Sri Thendayuthapani Temple). The shrine, with a large, attractive gopuram, was built in 1984 to replace a nineteenth-century temple constructed by Indian chettiars (moneylenders) and is dedicated mainly to the Hindu deity Lord Murugan. It’s also the destination of every participant in the procession that accompanies the annual Thaipusam Festival.

Bras Basah Road to Rochor Road

Bras Basah, City Hall, Dhoby Ghaut or Bencoolen/Rochor (when open) MRT

Bras Basah Road – the main thoroughfare between Orchard Road and what would have been the seafront – is so named because rice arriving on cargo boats used to be brought here to be dried (beras basah means “wet rice” in Malay). The zone between it and Rochor Road at the edge of Little India has a transitional sort of feel, sitting as it does between the Colonial District and two of Raffles’ ethnic enclaves to the northeast. The aptly named Middle Road, running smack through the centre of the grid, was originally meant to mark the Colonial District’s northern edge.

Despite modernization, the area still boasts some long-established places of worship and is another focus for the arts, home to institutions such as the School of the Arts in a striking new building next to the Cathay cinema, and to several creative organizations occupying distinguished old properties on and around Waterloo Street.

Raffles Hotel

1 Beach Rd • 6337 1886, raffles.com/singapore • Esplanade or City Hall MRT

The area’s most famous occupant is the legendary Raffles Hotel, almost a byword for the colonial era; Somerset Maugham once remarked that it “stood for all the fables of the exotic East”. With its gleaming white facade and location by the sea – that is, until land reclamation intervened – it very much recalls its former sister hotel, the Eastern & Oriental in George Town. Liveried, largely Sikh, doormen still greet arriving guests, and the inner courtyard is a true haven, fringed with palm and frangipani trees. If you’re not staying here, the best way to glimpse the place is by dining at one of its restaurants or treating yourself to a Singapore Sling in the Long Bar (for the princely sum of around S$40).

History of the hotel

Oddly, the hotel started out as a modest seafront bungalow belonging to an Arab trader. In 1886, the property was bought by the Armenian Sarkies brothers, who had only just launched the E&O; the Raffles opened the following year, and over the next twenty years it was gradually extended to something approaching its present scale. In 1902, according to an apocryphal tale, the last tiger to be killed on the island was shot inside the building. Bartender Ngiam Tong Boon created another Raffles legend, the Singapore Sling cocktail, in 1915. Over the years, the hotel has hosted many a politician and film star, but it is proudest of its literary connections. Hermann Hesse, Rudyard Kipling, Noël Coward and Günter Grass all stayed here, and Somerset Maugham is said to have written many of his Asian tales under a frangipani tree in the garden.

Following the Japanese conquest in 1942, the hotel became a Japanese officers’ quarters, then briefly a transit camp for liberated Allied prisoners in 1945. Postwar decay earned it the affectionate but melancholy soubriquet “the grand old lady of the East”, and the hotel was little more than a shabby tourist diversion when the government declared it a national monument in its centenary year. An expensive and contentious four-year facelift and extension followed, which restored the air of bygone elegance but also added a mundane shopping arcade on North Bridge Road. Another major refit was under way at the time of research, with the Raffles – its name now shared with other hotels in an international chain – due to reopen in the second half of 2018.

Waterloo Street

Bras Basah, Bencoolen or Bugis MRT

Head up Waterloo Street from the Art Museum and you’ll almost immediately come to the peach-coloured Maghain Aboth Synagogue, which looks like a colonial mansion despite the Stars of David on the facade. The surrounding area was once something of a Jewish enclave – another building midway along nearby Selegie Road bears a prominent Star of David – though the Jewish community, largely of Middle Eastern origin, never numbered more than about a thousand. Dating from the 1870s, the synagogue can be visited by prior arrangement (enquiries on 6337 2189).

Sri Krishnan Temple

152 Waterloo St • 6337 7957

In 1870 the Sri Krishnan Temple was nothing more than a thatched hut containing a statue of Lord Krishna under a banyan tree. The present-day shrine is a good example of Southeast Asian religious harmony and syncretism in action, with worshippers from the nearby Buddhist Kwan Im Temple sometimes praying outside.

Kwan Im Temple

178 Waterloo St • Daily 6am–6.30pm • 6337 3965

The best-known sight on Waterloo Street is the Kwan Im Temple, named after the Buddhist goddess of mercy. The current version dates only to the 1980s – hence its rather slick, palatial appearance – and draws thousands of devotees daily; it can be filled to overflowing during festivals. Fortune-tellers and religious artefact shops operate in a little swarm just outside.

Albert Street

Northern end of Waterloo St, close to Rochor Rd • Rochor, Bugis or Jalan Besar MRT

Intersecting Waterloo Street is Albert Street, which half a century ago looked quite like Jalan Alor in KL, lined with hugely popular street food stalls. All of that is now gone, although the street is still worth a stroll to gaze at the zigzagging glass facades of the Lasalle College of the Arts near the street’s northern end, or to check out the market that stays open into the evening around the junction with Waterloo Street, selling everything from potted plants to mobile phone cases. Albert Street is also the starting point for touristy trishaw excursions.

Bugis Village and Bugis Junction

Bugis MRT

Bugis Street (pronounced “boogis”), the southern extension of Albert Street, was one of the most notorious places in old Singapore, crawling with rowdy sailors, prostitutes and ladyboys by night. The street was duly cleared, partly to build the Bugis MRT station and partly because it was anathema to the government. In its place today is Bugis Village, a bunch of stalls and snack vendors lining a few covered alleyways. It’s hardly the Bugis Street of old, though it does recapture something of the bazaar feel that the island’s markets once had.

Across Victoria Street from here is another throwback to the past, the Bugis Junction development. Entire rows of shophouses have been gutted, scrubbed clean and then encased under glass as part of a modern shopping mall and hotel, the Intercontinental.

Little India

Little India, Farrer Park or Jalan Besar MRT; note that buses up Serangoon Rd return via Jalan Besar

Of all Singapore’s historic quarters, the most charismatic has to be Little India. Indian pop music blares out from speakers outside cassette shops; the air is perfumed with incense, curry powder and jasmine garlands; Hindu women parade in bright saris; and a wealth of restaurants serve up excellent, inexpensive curries.

That Little India has kept its identity better than any other old quarter is in no small way down to the migrant Tamil and Bengali men who labour to build new MRT stations, shopping malls and private villas. On Sundays they descend on Little India in their thousands, making the place look like downtown Chennai or Calcutta after a major cricket match. The district’s backbone is Serangoon Road, one of the island’s oldest roadways, dating from 1822; the account here starts from Tekka Market, next to Little India MRT, and then covers the side roads off Serangoon Road in stretches. The best time of year to visit is in the run-up to Deepavali (October or November) when much of Serangoon Road is festooned with festive lighting and special markets are set up in the open space beyond the Angullia Mosque (opposite Syed Alwi Road) and on Campbell Lane, which sell decorations, garlands and Indian sweets.

Tekka Market

Southwestern end of Serangoon Rd • Little India MRT

Tekka Market is a must-see, combining many of Little India’s commercial elements under one roof. It’s best to arrive in the morning when the wet market is at its busiest. Halal butchers push around trolleys piled high with goats’ heads, while live crabs, their claws tied together, shuffle in buckets on seafood stalls. Look out also for a couple of stalls selling nothing but banana leaves, used to serve up the curry meals you’ll probably enjoy at some point during your stay. Talking of food, the hawker centre here is excellent, and although the same can’t be said of the mundane outlets upstairs selling Indian fabrics and household items, there are great views over the wet market to be had from above.

Buffalo Road

Buffalo Road, along the northern side of Tekka Market, sports a few provisions stores with sacks of spices and fresh coconut, ground using primitive machines. Its name, and that of neighbouring Kerbau (“buffalo” in Malay) Road, recall the latter half of the nineteenth century when cattle and buffalo yards opened in the area, luring more Indians in search of work and swelling the population.

Kerbau Road

Kerbau Road, like Waterloo Street 1km south, is a designated “arts belt”, its shophouses home to a couple of creative organizations. Curiously, the road itself has been split into two by a pedestrianized bit of greenery. At no. 37, you can’t miss the gaudily restored Chinese mansion, built by one Tan Teng Niah, a confectionery magnate, in 1900 and now used as commercial premises. Look out also for the traditional picture framer at no. 57, packed with images of Hindu deities.

Sri Veeramakaliamman Temple

141 Serangoon Rd, just beyond Belilios Lane • 6295 4538, sriveeramakaliamman.com • Little India MRT

The Sri Veeramakaliamman Temple is the most prominent shrine on Serangoon Road and just as worthwhile as the more famous Sri Mariamman Temple in Chinatown. The temple is dedicated to Kali, the Hindu goddess of power or energy, and she occupies the central part of the three-doored sanctum inside the mandapam (prayer hall), with her sons, the deities Ganesh and Murugan, to the left and right respectively. One of many other notable deities here is the ten-armed figure to the left of the sanctum, Lord Shiva, shown trampling a moustachioed demon of ignorance.

Hastings Road to Cuff Road

Across Serangoon Road from the Tekka Market, the Little India Arcade is a lovingly restored block of shophouses bounded by Hastings Road and Campbell Lane. It’s a sort of Little India in microcosm: behind pastel-coloured walls and green shutters you can purchase textiles and tapestries, bangles, religious statuary, Indian sweets, music and Ayurvedic herbal medicines. Exiting the arcade onto Campbell Lane places you opposite the riot of colours of the Jothi flower shop, where staff thread jasmine, roses and marigolds into garlands for prayer offerings.

Indian Heritage Centre

5 Campbell Lane • Tues–Thurs 10am–7pm, Fri & Sat 10am–8pm, Sun 10am–4pm • S$6 • 6291 1601, indianheritage.org.sg • Rochor, Little India or Jalan Besar MRT

With its startling honeycombed glass facade, the Indian Heritage Centre was launched in 2015 but has yet to hit its stride. The museum is the main draw. Start on the top floor for a broad look at Indian traditions via some impressive statuary and carvings, then descend to the rather mundane sections dealing with themes such as stereotypical occupations once pursued by Indian migrants (rubber tappers, policemen and so on).

Dunlop Street and around

Dunlop Street is defined by the beautiful Abdul Gaffoor Mosque, completed in 1907 (Mon–Thurs, Sat & Sun 8am–8pm, Fri 8am–noon & 2.30–8pm). With a green onion dome and cream walls decorated with stars and crescent moons, the mosque includes an unusual 25-pointed sundial bearing the names of the same number of prophets in Arabic script. A couple of streets along is Cuff Road, where a traditional spice grinder can still be seen at no. 2, though it’s mainly open at weekends.

Rowell and Desker roads

Both Rowell and Desker roads mark a noticeable shift from the South Indian flavour of much of Little India, with Bengali featuring prominently on some shops signs. However, both roads have another claim to fame – or infamy – as they have long been synonymous in Singapore with vice. Along the backs of the shophouses between the two roads is an alleyway where the doorways are illuminated at night. Here gaggles of bored-looking prostitutes sit indoors watching TV, seemingly oblivious to the men gathered outside who mostly appear inclined to merely observe them, as if treating the whole thing as some kind of street entertainment.

Syed Alwi Road to Petain Road

Farrer Park MRT

Little India takes on a more Islamic feel around Syed Alwi Road, across from which is the Angullia Mosque at its northern end, but the road is better known for being the hub of the shopping phenomenon that is the Mustafa Centre. It’s an agglomeration of department store, moneychanger, travel agent, jeweller, fast-food joint and supermarket, mostly open 24 hours. You’ll probably find it more appealing than most places on Orchard Road, as you rub shoulders with Indian families seeking flown-in confectionery from Delhi, Chinese and Malay shoppers wanting durian fruit or pots and pans, and even African businessmen buying consumer goods that are hard to find at home.

Sam Leong Road is home to some surviving Peranakan shophouses decorated with stags, lotuses and egrets. There’s more of the same a few blocks north on Petain Road, where the shophouses have elegant ceramic tiles reminiscent of Portuguese azulejos.

Sri Srinivasa Perumal Temple

397 Serangoon Rd • Daily 6.30am–noon & 6–9pm, though it may be possible to visit at other times • 6298 5771, sspt.org.sg • Farrer Park MRT

Little India more or less comes to an end at Rangoon and Kitchener roads, but it’s worth continuing up Serangoon Road to see two very different temples. Dating from the late nineteenth century, though rebuilt in the 1960s, the Sri Srinivasa Perumal Temple has an attractive five-tiered gopuram with sculptures of the various manifestations of Lord Vishnu the preserver. On the wall to the right of the front gate, a sculpted elephant trumpets silently, its leg caught in a crocodile’s mouth. But the temple’s main claim to fame is as the starting point for the annual Thaipusam festival, when devotees leave the temple in procession, pausing only while a coconut is smashed at their feet for good luck, and parade all the way to the Chettiar Temple on Tank Road.

Sakaya Muni Buddha Gaya Temple

366 Race Course Rd • Daily 8am–4.30pm • Farrer Park MRT

Just beyond the Sri Srinivasa Perumal Temple, a small path leads northwest to Race Course Road, where the slightly kitsch Sakaya Muni Buddha Gaya Temple betrays a strong Thai influence – which isn’t surprising as it was built by a Thai monk. On the left of the temple as you enter is a huge Buddha’s footprint, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and beyond it a 15m-high Buddha ringed by a thousand electric lights. Twenty-five dioramas depicting scenes from the Buddha’s life decorate the pedestal on which he sits. It is possible to walk inside the statue, through a door in its back; inside is one more diorama, depicting the Buddha in death. One wall of the temple features a sort of wheel of fortune, decorated with Chinese zodiac signs. To discover your fate, spin it (for a small donation) and take the numbered sheet of paper that corresponds to the number at which the wheel stops.

Arab Street (Kampong Glam)

Bugis or Nicoll Highway MRT

The area of Singapore south of the now canalized Rochor River once held a Malay village known as Kampong Glam, possibly named after the gelam tree that grew there. After signing the dubious treaty with his newly installed Johor sultan, Raffles allotted the area to him and designated the land around it as a Muslim settlement. Soon the zone was attracting Malays, Sumatrans and Javanese, as well as Hadhrami Arabs from what’s now eastern Yemen. Now the Arab community, descended from those Yemeni traders, is thought to number around 15,000, though they are something of an invisible minority, having intermarried into Singapore society and being resident in no particular area.

Today, the area is still referred to as Kampong Glam or just Arab Street, and is akin in some ways to London’s Brick Lane, part Islamic, part hipster. Gentrification seems to be winning out, though, with slick upstart restaurants, many serving alcohol (to the chagrin of some locals), displacing old textiles stores and curry houses. Nevertheless it’s worth spending an hour wandering the area’s lanes, with the Sultan Mosque and the Malay Heritage Centre being the two obvious sights. The little shophouses on Arab Street itself and the surrounding lanes have a cosiness and intimacy that’s more George Town than Lion City. Textile and carpet stores are most prominent, and you’ll also see leather, basketware, gold, gemstones and jewellery for sale.

Haji Lane and Bali Lane

South of Arab Street, Haji Lane and tiny Bali Lane – the latter petering out into the wide walkway next to Ophir Road – have traditional shops rubbing up against trendy boutiques; in the evenings and at weekends DJs set up informally to spin dance music on Haji Lane.

Incidentally, it’s worth taking a brief look at the Parkview Square office building just across from here on North Bridge Road. Though the tower is only a decade old, its styling just screams 1930s Art Deco (à la Gotham City), and there’s a stunning ground-floor bar in the same vein, Atlas. When it was built, the need to ensure good feng shui meant it had to be sited dead between the two razor-blade-like towers of The Gateway one block south (designed by the Chinese-American architect I.M. Pei – the man behind the glass pyramid fronting the Louvre in Paris).

Sultan Mosque

3 Muscat St • Mon–Thurs & Sat 9.30am–noon & 2–4pm, Fri 2.30–4pm • Free • 6293 4405, sultanmosque.org.sg • Bugis or Jalan Besar MRT

The Sultan Mosque is the beating heart of the Muslim faith in Singapore. An earlier mosque stood on this site, finished in 1825 with the help of a donation from the East India Company. The present building was completed a century later to a design by colonial architects Swan and Maclaren. Look carefully at the base of the main dome and you’ll see a dark band that looks like tilework, though it actually consists of the bottoms of thousands of glass bottles. The prayer hall is decked out in green and gold, but non-Muslims must look on from just inside the entrance.

Bussorah Street to the south offers the best view of the mosque, and is also home to some worthwhile souvenir outlets. During the Muslim fasting month, the area around the mosque is thronged with stalls of the Ramadan bazaar from mid-afternoon, selling biriyanis, murtabak, dates and cakes for consumption by the faithful after dusk.

Deepavali Market, little india

The Malay Heritage Centre (Istana Kampong Glam)

Sultan Gate • Tues–Sun 10am–6pm • S$4 • 6391 0450, malayheritage.org.sg • Bugis or Nicoll Highway MRT

Between Kandahar and Aliwal streets, the colonially styled Istana Kampong Glam was built as the palace of Sultan Ali Iskandar Shah, son of Sultan Hussein who negotiated with Raffles to hand Singapore over to the British. Until just a few years ago the house was still home to the sultan’s descendants, though it had fallen into disrepair. Then the government acquired it together with the similar, smaller yellow house in the same grounds, which belonged to the heirs of a wealthy merchant.

The yellow house now hosts an attempt at a posh Malay restaurant, while the istana has mutated into the overly slick Malay Heritage Centre, a hit-and-miss museum. The best displays celebrate the rural boat-building and fishing lifestyle of yore, plus Singapore’s unjustly overlooked Malay literary and pop-culture scene of the postwar period. But there’s a deafening silence on the building of new towns – a mixed blessing for all who experienced upheaval and relocation, especially for the Malays, who saw practically all their kampungs razed and communities broken up.

North of Sultan Mosque

The stretch of North Bridge Road between Arab Street and Jalan Sultan has a less touristy feel, and although gentrification is evident here, too, the shops and restaurants tend to be geared more towards locals, stocking items such as alcohol-free perfume and the black, fez-like songkok traditionally worn by Malay men.

Several roads run off the western side of North Bridge Road, including Jalan Kubor (literally “Grave Street”), which takes you to an unkempt Muslim cemetery, where it’s said that Malay royalty are buried. Turn right here up Kallang Road to reach Jalan Sultan and the blue Malabar Mosque, built for Muslims from the South Indian state of Kerala and a little cousin of the Sultan Mosque, with similar golden domes. Its traditional styling belies its age – the mosque was completed in the early 1960s.

The Hajjah Fatimah mosque

4001 Beach Rd, just east of the junction with Jalan Sultan • Nicoll Highway or Lavender MRT

Beach Road’s chandlers and fishing-gear shops betray its former proximity to the sea, until land reclamation created Nicoll Highway and the Marina Centre district. One quirky sight here is the Hajjah Fatimah Mosque, its minaret looking strangely like a steeple (perhaps because its architect was European). The minaret also visibly slants at six degrees to the vertical – locals call it Singapore’s Leaning Tower of Pisa. Completed in 1846, the building is named after a wealthy Melaka businesswoman who, having moved out of her home on this site, funded the mosque’s construction.

Chinatown

Chinatown, Telok Ayer, Outram Park, Tanjong Pagar or Clarke Quay MRT; buses run southwest along North and South Bridge roads and New Bridge Rd, returning along Eu Tong Sen St

Bounded roughly by Eu Tong Sen Street to the northwest, Neil and Maxwell roads to the south, Cecil Street to the southeast and the Singapore River to the north, Chinatown is somewhat misnamed. Never really an enclave – Singapore has long had a Chinese majority, after all – it was more the focus of Chinese life and culture. Within its two square kilometres, newly arrived migrants found temples, shops with familiar goods and, most importantly, kongsis – clan associations that helped them find lodgings and work.

This was one of the most colourful districts of old Singapore, but after independence the government tackled its tumbledown slums by embarking upon a drastic redevelopment campaign. Not until the 1980s did surviving shophouses and other period buildings begin to be conserved. Furthermore, gentrification has led to kongsis and religious and martial arts associations being turned into boutique hotels, new media firms and bars. Getting a taste of the old ways now often means heading off the main streets into the concrete municipal housing estates.

Even so, as in Little India, the character of the area has had a bit of a shot in the arm of late courtesy of recent immigrants. As regards sights, the Thian Hock Keng, Buddha Tooth Relic and Sri Mariamman temples are especially worthwhile, as is the Chinatown Heritage Centre museum, and there’s enough shophouse architecture to justify a leisurely wander.

Chinatown Heritage Centre

48 Pagoda St • Daily 9am–8pm; last admission 7pm • S$15 • 6224 3928, chinatownheritagecentre.com.sg • Chinatown MRT

One exit from Chinatown MRT brings you up into the thick of the action on Pagoda Street, where the Chinatown Heritage Centre stands in marked contrast to the tacky souvenir stalls. Occupying three whole shophouses, it’s a museum enshrining the difficult experiences of Chinatown’s inhabitants over the past couple of centuries.

Things kick off with a recreation of a comparatively spacious postwar tailor’s shop; note the cloth ring dangling down from the ceiling, meant for holding a baby’s cot, as still happens in rural Malaysia. Soon you’re into the claustrophic living cubicles, recreating conditions in shophouse slums, where you’d find trishaw drivers, clog-makers and prostitutes living cheek by jowl. Landlords once shoehorned as many as forty tenants into a single floor; if you think it couldn’t possibly happen today, spare a thought for the thousands of migrant workers on building sites all over Singapore, many of whom are crammed into very basic dormitories. Other sections revisit the sadly vanished nightlife of postwar Chinatown and, commendably, the area’s Indian minorities.

Along South Bridge Road

Head down Pagoda Street from the Chinatown Heritage Centre and you come to South Bridge Road, one of Chinatown’s main thoroughfares, carrying southbound traffic. At no. 218, on the corner of Mosque Street, stands the pastel green Jamae Mosque (also called the Chulia Mosque), established by South Indian Muslims in the 1820s. Its twin minarets appear to contain miniature windows while above the entrance stands what looks like a tiny doorway, all of which makes the upper part of the facade look strangely like a scale model of a much larger building.

One street northeast, at the junction with Upper Cross Street, roadblocks were set up during the Japanese occupation, and Singaporeans were vetted for signs of anti-Japanese sentiment in the infamous Sook Ching campaign. That tragic episode is commemorated by a simple signboard in the Hong Lim Complex, a housing estate whose walkways are lined with herbalists and stores selling dried foodstuffs and so forth.

To top up your blood-sugar level while wandering the area, pop into the Tong Heng pastry shop (daily 9am–10pm) at no. 285, which sells custard tarts, lotus-seed-paste biscuits and other Chinese sweet treats.

Sri Mariamman Temple

244 South Bridge Rd • Daily 7am–9pm; main sanctum usually closed noon–6pm • Free; cameras RM3 • 6223 4064 • Chinatown or Telok Ayer MRT

Singapore’s oldest Hindu shrine, the Sri Mariamman Temple, has its roots in a wood and palm-thatch hut erected here in 1827 on land belonging to Naraina Pillay, a government clerk who arrived on the same ship as Stamford Raffles on the latter’s second trip to Singapore. The present temple was finished around 1843, though it has been extended and overhauled several times since.

Inside, walk around the courtyard to admire the temple’s roof friezes depicting a host of Hindu deities. The main sanctum is devoted to Mariamman, a goddess worshipped for her healing powers. Smaller sanctums include one dedicated to the goddess Periachi Amman, portrayed with a queen lying on her lap, whose evil child she has ripped from her womb; it’s odd, then, that Periachi Amman is the protector of children, to whom babies are brought when one month old.

Once a year, during the festival of Thimithi (October or November), a patch of sand to the left of the main sanctum is covered in red-hot coals that male Hindus run across to prove their faith. The participants, who line up all the way along South Bridge Road waiting for their turn, are supposedly protected from the heat by the power of prayer.

Eu Yan Sang Medical Hall

269 South Bridge Rd • Mon–Sat 8.30am–6pm • 6225 3211 • Chinatown or Telok Ayer MRT

Across from the Sri Mariamman Temple is the Eu Yan Sang Medical Hall, one of the oldest Chinese herbalist practices in the area. The smell is the first thing you’ll notice (a little like a compost heap on a hot day); the second is the weird assortment of ingredients on the shelves. Besides the usual herbs and roots favoured by the Chinese, there are various remedies derived from exotic species; blood circulation problems, for instance, can supposedly be eased by mixtures of centipedes and insects crushed into a “rubbing liquor”. The shop includes a set of displays extolling the health benefits of that much prized delicacy, the edible birds’ nest, made of swiftlet saliva and harvested at sites such as the Niah Caves in Sarawak (or from birds reared in bricked-up town-centre shophouses, which is why the swiftlets can be seen wheeling at dawn and dusk over many Malaysian town centres).

Buddha Tooth Relic Temple

288 South Bridge Rd • Daily 7am–7pm • Free • 6220 0220, btrts.org.sg • No shorts, vests or non-vegetarian food • Chinatown or Tanjong Pagar MRT

The imposing Buddha Tooth Relic Temple is arguably the most in-your-face of Chinatown’s shrines. The place simply clobbers you with its opulence – even the elevators have brocaded walls – and the thousands upon thousands of Buddhist figurines, each with its own serial number, arrayed along various interior surfaces.

With gently curving roofs featuring tiles and other ornaments made in Japan, the temple has its origins in the discovery, in 1980, of what was thought to be a tooth of Buddha inside a collapsed stupa at a Burmese monastery. The monastery’s chief abbot visited Singapore in 2002 and decided the island would make a suitable sanctuary for the relic, to be housed in its own temple if there were a chance of building one. A prime site in Chinatown was duly secured, and the temple opened in 2007.

The main hall

The focus of the main hall is Maitreya, a Buddha who is yet to appear on Earth. Carved from juniper wood said to be 1000 years old, his statue has a yellow flame-like halo around it. But what really captures the attention are the Buddhas covering the entire side walls. There are a hundred main statuettes, individually crafted, interspersed with thousands more tiny figurines embedded in a vast array of shelving. Behind the main hall, another large hall centres on the Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva.

The mezzanine affords great views over proceedings and chanting ceremonies in the main hall, while level 2 contains the temple’s own teahouse.

Buddhist Culture Museum

Daily 9am–6pm

On level 3 are some seriously impressive examples of Buddhist statuary in brass, wood and stone, plus other artworks. They’re all part of the Buddhist Culture Museum, with panels telling the story of Gautama Buddha in the first person. At the back, the relic chamber displays what are said to be the cremated remains of Buddha’s nose, brain, liver etc, all looking like fish roe in different colours.

Sacred Buddha Tooth Relic Stupa

Daily 9am–noon & 3–6pm

On level 4 you finally encounter what all the fuss is ultimately about – the Sacred Buddha Tooth Relic Stupa. Some 3m in diameter, it sits behind glass panels and can’t be inspected close up, though there is a faithful scale model at the front. The Maitreya Buddha is depicted at the front of the stupa, guarded by four lions, with a ring of 35 more Buddhas below; floor tiles around the stupa are said to be made of pure gold.

The roof garden

The temple’s lovely roof garden has walls lined with twelve thousand tiny figurines of the Amitayus Buddha, but its centrepiece is “the largest cloisonné prayer wheel in the world”, around 5m tall. Each rotation (clockwise, should you wish to have a go) dings a bell and represents the recitation of one sutra.

Sago Street

The tight knot of streets west of South Bridge Road between Sago Street and Pagoda Street is Chinatown at its most touristy, packed with souvenir sellers and foreigner-friendly restaurants. But in bygone days these streets formed Chinatown’s nucleus, teeming with trishaws, food stalls, brothels and opium dens. Until as recently as the 1950s, Sago Street was home to several death houses, rudimentary hospices where citizens nearing the end of their lives spent their final hours on rattan beds.

Smith Street

Smith Street is perennially being promoted as Chinatown Food Street, after several half-cocked attempts to repackage it and Trengganu Street as a hub for street eating – ironically, the very thing Singapore abolished decades ago – and the latest involves a slew of phoney-looking hawker “pushcarts”. Chinatown’s old trades can occasionally be seen clinging on for dear life, such as Nam’s Supplies at no. 22, where they make shirts, watches, mobile phones and laptops out of paper for burning at funerals, to ensure the deceased don’t lack creature comforts in the next life. The ugly, concrete Chinatown Complex at the end of the street is a workaday place housing outlets selling silk and household goods, and has some excellent food stalls above.

The Bukit Pasoh conservation area

Outram Park MRT

In the southernmost corner of Chinatown is an area packed with restored shophouses, worth a look for their beautifully painted facades, some in Art Deco style, and tilework. Clan houses were once the claim to fame of Bukit Pasoh Road, but while some have survived with their character intact, many more have morphed into boutiques or boutique hotels; the Gan Clan’s building at 18–20 Bukit Pasoh Rd now rents out space to a posh restaurant. There are clan houses on neighbouring Keong Saik Road too, once a notorious red-light area as recounted in Charmaine Leung’s memoir, 17A Keong Saik Road.

New Bridge Road and Eu Tong Sen Street

Chinatown’s main shopping drag comprises southbound New Bridge Road and northbound Eu Tong Sen Street, along which are a handful of shopping malls. Try to pop into one of the barbecued-pork vendors around the intersection of Smith, Temple and Pagoda streets with New Bridge Road – as they’re cooked, the thin, flat, red squares of bak kwa, coated with a sweet marinade, produce a rich, smoky odour that is pure Chinatown. As you chew on your bak kwa, check out two striking buildings across the road. On the left is the Art Deco Majestic Theatre, built in 1927 as a Chinese opera house by Eu Tong Sen, the wealthy businessman behind the Eu Yan Sang Chinese medicine franchise. Today it has been reduced to housing a few forgettable shops, but five images of figures from Chinese opera still adorn its facade. Just beside it, and built a few years later, stands the former Great Southern Hotel (today the Yue Hwa Chinese Products Emporium), which had a fifth-floor nightclub where wealthy locals would drink liquor, smoke opium and pay to dance with so-called “taxi girls”.

Ann Siang Hill

Ann Siang Hill is both the name of a little mound and of a lane that leads off South Bridge Road up a slope, where it forks into Club Street on the left and Ann Siang Road, which veers gently right. Despite being only a few paces removed from the hubbub of the main road, the hill is somehow a different realm, a little collection of gentrified shophouses with a distinct village-like feel. Packed with swanky restaurants, cafés and bars, plus the odd boutique, the area typifies the new Chinatown. At the southern end of the road, a short flight of steps leads up to Ann Siang Hill Park, a sliver of generic greenery whose only attraction is that it offers a short cut to Amoy Street.

Club Street

Scarcely any of the clan associations and guilds whose presence gave Club Street its name now remain. Most notable of all is the Chinese Weekly Entertainment Club at the end of a side street also called Club Street. Flanked by roaring lion heads, this mansion-like building was constructed in 1891 as a venue where Peranakan tycoons could socialize, and still serves as a private club today.

Singapore City Gallery

URA Centre, 45 Maxwell Rd • Mon–Sat 9am–5pm • Free • 6321 8321, ura.gov.sg/gallery • Tanjong Pagar or Telok Ayer MRT

Town planning may not sound the most fascinating premise for a gallery, but then again, no nation remodels with such ambition as Singapore, whose planners are constantly erasing roads here and replacing one ultramodern complex with an even more souped-up development. The latest grand designs for the island are exhibited west of Ann Siang Hill at the surprisingly absorbing Singapore City Gallery, within the government Urban Redevelopment Authority’s headquarters.

The URA has rightly been criticized in the past for slighting Singapore’s architectural heritage, so it is heartening that the gallery not only explains how shophouses have evolved stylistically but also makes reassuring noises about preserving the ones that remain. But the highlight is the vast and incredibly intricate scale model of downtown Singapore, with every row of shophouses, every roof of every building – including some not yet built – fashioned out of plywood.

Amoy Street

Amoy Street, together with Telok Ayer Street, was designated a Hokkien enclave in the colony’s early days (Amoy being the old name of Xiamen city in China’s Fujian province). Long terraces of smartly refurbished shophouses flank the street, all featuring characteristic five-foot ways, or covered verandas, so called because they jut five feet out from the house. If you descend here from Ann Siang Hill Park, you’ll emerge by the small Sian Chai Kang Temple at no. 66. With the customary dragons on the roof, it’s dominated by huge urns, full to the brim with ash from untold numbers of burned incense sticks. Two carved stone lions guard the temple; their fancy red neck-ribbons are said to bring good fortune and prosperity.

Telok Ayer Street

One street removed from Amoy Street is Telok Ayer Street, its name, meaning “Watery Bay” in Malay, recalling the mid-nineteenth century when the street would have run along the shoreline. Thanks to land reclamation, it’s no closer to a beach than Beach Road is, but some of Singapore’s oldest buildings cling on between the modern towers – temples and mosques where newly arrived immigrants and sailors thanked their god(s) for their safe passage.

The first building of note you come to if you walk up from the station is the square 1889 Chinese Methodist Church, whose design – portholes and windows adorned with white crosses and capped by a Chinese pagoda-style roof – is a pleasing blend of East and West. Just beyond McCallum Street, the blue-and-white Al-Abrar Mosque is built on the spot where Chulia worshippers set up a makeshift thatched mosque in 1827.

Thian Hock Keng Temple and around

158 Telok Ayer St • Daily 7.30am–5.30pm • Free • 6423 4616, thianhockkeng.com.sg • Telok Ayer or Chinatown MRT

With ornate dragons stalking its broad, low-slung roofs, the immaculately restored Thian Hock Keng Temple feels marooned in a sea of commercialization, and with much of Chinatown’s community uprooted, it is something of a museum piece, one that schoolkids are taken to so they can glimpse life in “the old days”.

A statue of the goddess Mazu, shipped in from southern China in time for the temple’s completion in 1842, stands in the centre of the main hall, flanked by the martial figure of Guan Yu on the right and physician Bao Sheng on the left. Against the left wall, look out for an altar containing the curious figures of General Fan and General Xie. The two are said to have arranged to meet by a river bridge, but Xie was delayed; Fan waited doggedly and drowned in a flash flood, which supposedly accounts for his grimace and dark skin. When Xie finally arrived, he was filled with guilt and hanged himself – hence his depiction, with tongue hanging down to his chest.

Incidentally, the pagoda visible to the left from Telok Ayer Street, called Chongwen Ge, formed part of an adjacent school, a site that now hosts a Peranakan café and tile shop. It’s also worth walking around to Amoy Street to see the back-wall mural by Yip Yew Chong, an accountant who does street art in his spare time; it kicks off on the right with the Chinatown of old in sepia and ends with a full-colour fantasy in which both existing and demolished towers in the Financial District loom over a river still busy with cargo-filled bumboats.

Nagore Durgha Shrine

140 Telok Ayer St • Museum daily 10am–6pm • Free

It’s a testament to Singapore’s multicultural nature that Thian Hock Keng’s next-door neighbour is the charming brown-and-white Nagore Durgha Shrine to the Muslim ascetic, Shahul Hamid of Nagore. It was built in the 1820s by Chulias from southern India, as was the Jamae Mosque, so it’s not surprising that the buildings appear to be cut from the same architectural cloth.

Part of the shrine now houses a fine little museum dedicated to the history of Telok Ayer Street. The few simple artefacts and photographs do a good job of unpacking the nuances of Muslim Indian identity in Singapore, a country where Hindu Indians are referred to by the part of India they emigrated from, yet their Muslim counterparts are lumped together under the banner of their faith.

Ying Fo Fui Kun

98 Telok Ayer St, beyond the junction with Cross St • Telok Ayer or Chinatown MRT

Among the smartest of Chinatown’s surviving clan houses, the Ying Fo Fui Kun was established in 1822 by Hakkas from Guangdong province. It has narrowly avoided being swallowed up by the adjacent Far East Square complex, but in its present orderly state, with an immaculate altar boasting gilt calligraphy and carvings, it’s hard to imagine it having been the hub of an entire community. Periodic membership drives try to stop it turning into a senior citizens’ club, given that provincial dialects – traditionally used as a marker of identity among the Chinese – have been on the decline since the 1970s following an aggressive state campaign to standardize on Mandarin.

Far East Square

Far East Square is a sort of heritage development, engulfing the shophouses of what would have been the northernmost part of Amoy Street. Also co-opted into the complex, indeed into a hotel, is the Fuk Tak Chi Street Museum (76 Telok Ayer St; daily 10am–10pm; free). This was once Singapore’s oldest temple, having been founded by Hakka and Cantonese migrants in 1824; now its altar holds a model junk crewed by sailors in blue shorts. A diorama depicts Telok Ayer Street in its waterfront heyday, with a stage set up in front of the temple and opera performers getting ready to strut their stuff.

Hong Lim Park

Between Upper Pickering St and North Canal Rd • Clarke Quay MRT

A few minutes’ walk southwest from the Singapore River, Hong Lim Park is not much more than a field ringed by trees, but it’s of symbolic significance as the home of Speakers’ Corner, at its northern edge. Since its designation in 2000, citizens have, in theory, been able to speak their minds here, just as people do at its famous exemplar in central London. This being Singapore, regulations require you to register your intention to speak and prohibit discussion of religion or anything that could be deemed to provoke racial discontent. Despite this, the site has regained some of its historic role as a site for political meetings and also hosts the annual gay pride event, Pink Dot.

Boat Quay

Close to the old mouth of the Singapore River, the pedestrianized row of waterfront shophouses known as Boat Quay is one of Singapore’s most commercially successful bids at urban regeneration. Derelict in the early 1990s, it’s since become a thriving hangout, sporting a huge collection of restaurants and bars. The area’s historical significance may be easier to appreciate through its street names – Synagogue Street nearby, for example, was the site of the island’s first synagogue.

Yueh Hai Ching Temple

30B Philip St

Recently restored, the twin-shrined Yueh Hai Ching Temple (also called Wak Hai Cheng Bio) feels even more isolated than the Thian Hock Keng, nestling as it does among the towers where Chinatown merges into the Financial District. Completed in the 1850s, it is another of the area’s temples built on the old coastline, and was a magnet for newly arrived migrants who, once ashore at Bullock Cart Water (the translation of the Chinese name, used to this day, for what would become Chinatown), would come here to give thanks for their safe arrival. Hai Ching means “calm sea” and an effigy of Tian Hou or Mazu, the queen of heaven and protector of seafarers, is housed in the right-hand shrine. Be sure to look up at the roof, crammed with scenes from Chinese folklore built up using the traditional jiannian technique, involving multicoloured porcelain shards.

Tanjong Pagar

Tanjong Pagar or Outram Park MRT

The district of Tanjong Pagar, south of Chinatown, was once a veritable sewer of opium dens and brothels. Then it was earmarked as a conservation area and many dozens of shophouses were refurbished as bars, restaurants and shops, notably on Neil Road and Duxton Hill. A grander example of the area’s architecture can be found right where South Bridge Road flows into Neil and Tanjong Pagar roads: here you’ll easily spot the arches and bricked facade of the Jinrikisha Building, constructed at the turn of the last century as a terminus for rickshaws.

Tanjong Pagar’s most interesting attraction is the Baba House, though as an architectural attention-grabber it’s rivalled by the seven interlinked towers of Pinnacle@Duxton, a showpiece municipal housing development on Cantonment Road, dominating Chinatown’s southern skyline.

Taking Chinese tea

At two Tanjong Pagar teahouses, visitors can glean something of the deep Chinese connection with tea by taking part in a workshop lasting up to an hour. Participants are introduced to different varieties of tea and talked through the history of tea cultivation and the rituals of brewing and appreciating the drink. The water, for example, has to reach an optimum temperature that depends on the type of tea being prepared; experts can tell its heat by the size of the rising bubbles, described variously as “sand eyes”, “prawn eyes”, “fish eyes”, etc. Both venues also stock an extensive range of tea-related accoutrements such as tall “sniffer” cups used to savour the aroma of the brew before it is poured into squat teacups for drinking.

Tea Chapter 9–11 Neil Rd 6226 1175, teachapter.com. Tea appreciation sessions starting at S$45 per head with snacks, or full-blown four-session courses at S$200 per person, for two or more people.

Yixing Yuan Teahouse 78 Tanjong Pagar Rd 6224 6961, yixingxuan-teahouse.com. Hour-long workshops from S$25 per head for a group of at least five.

Baba House

157 Neil Rd • Free • 6227 5731, babahouse.nus.edu.sg • Outram Park MRT (Cantonment Rd exit), or bus #174 from Orchard Rd or Bras Basah Rd to its terminus

The Baba House is one of Singapore’s most impressive museums, partly because it isn’t really a museum: what you see is a late nineteenth- or early twentieth-century Peranakan house, meticulously restored to its appearance in the late 1920s, a particularly prosperous time in its history. Like Penang’s Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion, the place is easily spotted as it’s painted a vivid blue. Note the phoenixes and peonies on the eaves above the entrance, signifying longevity and wealth respectively and, together, marital bliss. Even more eye-catching is the pintu pagar, the swing doors with gilt and mother-of-pearl inlays. Note that taking one of the five weekly tours is compulsory – book at least a week in advance.

The ground floor

Beyond the pintu pagar, the altar here, among the last of its kind in Singapore, is backed by an exquisitely carved wood screen behind which the women of the household could eavesdrop on proceedings. Beyond it is the family hall, with an air well open to the sky in its midst. Note the original tilework depicting roses and tulips, indicating European influence, and the gilt bats on the walls – bats, bianfu in Mandarin, are considered lucky because fu is a homonym for the Chinese character meaning “good fortune”.

The upper floors

Upstairs at the front end of the house, the centrepiece of the main bedroom is an ornate wooden four-poster bed with gilt and red lacquer decorations, bearing carved motifs such as musical instruments and yet more bats. Your guide will almost certainly open up the peephole in the floor, exposing a small shaft down to the main hall. The third storey, a later addition, is used for temporary exhibitions.

The Financial District

Raffles Place, Telok Ayer or Downtown MRT

If Singapore’s Financial District (or Central Business District/CBD; map) figures in the popular imagination at all, it would be because of the rogue trader Nick Leeson, whose antics here brought about the Barings Bank collapse of the 1990s. The area, south of the mouth of the Singapore River, has no specific sights but makes a reasonable prelude to nearby Boat Quay, Telok Ayer Street, the Colonial District (via Cavenagh Bridge) or the southern part of Marina Bay.

Raffles Place

What is now the Financial District was a swamp until land reclamation in the mid-1820s rendered it fit for building. Within just a few years, it was home to the colony’s busiest business address, Commercial Square, boasting the banks, ships’ chandlers and warehouses of a burgeoning trading port. The square later became the island’s main shopping area until Orchard Road overtook it in the late 1960s; today known as Raffles Place, it’s the heart of Singapore’s high-profile banking sector.

Surfacing from Raffles Place MRT, follow the signs for Raffles Place itself to feel like an ant in a canyon of skyscrapers. To see what things look like from the top of that canyon, the place to head is One Raffles Place, the complex to the west of the square, with truly stunning views from its rooftop bar, 1-Altitude. The three roads that run southwest from Raffles Place – Cecil Street, Robinson Road and Shenton Way – are all chock-a-block with more high-rise banks and financial houses.

Battery Road

Heading towards the river from Raffles Place, you reach Battery Road, its name recalling the days when Fort Fullerton (named after Robert Fullerton, first governor of the Straits Settlements) and its attendant battery of guns stood to the east on the site of the elegant Fullerton Building – the main attraction today. This was one of Singapore’s tallest buildings when it was constructed in 1928 as the General Post Office, a role it fulfilled until the mid-1990s. These days, it serves as the luxury Fullerton hotel; head inside to plunge into the Neoclassical and Art Deco splendour of the atrium, with a Y-shaped marbled staircase surmounting a carp-filled fishpond, and enormous columns reminiscent of Egyptian temples.

Collyer Quay

Collyer Quay runs south along the western shore of Marina Bay from what was the mouth of the Singapore River, linking the Colonial District with Raffles Quay and Shenton Way further south, both of which mark the former line of the seafront. Just east of Collyer Quay, the Merlion Park is home to a cement statue of Singapore’s national symbol, the Merlion. Half-lion, half-fish and wholly ugly, the creature reflects the island’s maritime connections and the old tale concerning the derivation of its present name, derived from the Sanskrit “Singapura”, meaning “Lion City”.

Clifford Pier

80 Collyer Quay

South of the park, the Art Deco Clifford Pier building, long the departure point for boat trips out to Singapore’s southern islands, was rendered defunct by the barrage that seals Marina Bay off from the sea. The building, along with the Customs House building a minute’s walk on, have been transformed into restaurant complexes, run by the firm that owns the Fullerton hotel; part of Clifford Pier forms the entrance to the hotel’s pricier new sibling, the Fullerton Bay.

Lau Pa Sat

18 Raffles Quay

Arguably the best place for refreshments in the Financial District is the charmingly old-world Lau Pa Sat, literally meaning “old market” – it was built in 1894 as a place for traders to sell produce. Also known by its original name, Telok Ayer Market, Lau Pa Sat has served as a hawker centre since the 1970s, except for a hiatus in the 1980s when tunnelling for the MRT required the octagonal cast-iron structure to be dismantled, then reassembled piece by piece. Aficionados of satay should turn up in the evening, when vendors set up in a row outside on Boon Tat Street.

Marina Bay

Bayfront, Downtown or Promenade MRT

It’s hard not to be awed by the audacity of Marina Bay, the project that has transformed downtown Singapore’s seafront over two generations. An exorbitantly ambitious piece of civil engineering, it entailed the creation of three massive expanses of reclaimed land and a barrage to seal off the basins of the Singapore and Kallang rivers from the sea. The result is a seaside freshwater reservoir with a crucial role in reducing Singapore’s dependence on Malaysian water supplies.

Although the bay’s southern “jaw”, Marina South, now sprouts a host of bank buildings to rival Raffles Place, the area is dominated by the Marina Bay Sands casino resort, with its museum and rooftop restaurants; it is inevitably the focus of any visit to the bay, along with the extravagant new Gardens by the Bay next door. Close to the Padang, the Theatres on the Bay arts complex is worth a detour for its skyline views, with more of the same available from the oversized Ferris wheel of the Singapore Flyer.

Marina Bay Sands

10 Bayfront Ave • 6688 8826, marinabaysands.com • Bayfront MRT

Rarely does a building become an icon quite as instantly as the Marina Bay Sands hotel and casino, its three 55-floor towers topped and connected by a vast, curved-surfboard-like deck, the SkyPark. Even if you have no interest in the casino – open 24/7, naturally – the complex, which includes a convention centre, a shopping mall, two concert venues, numerous restaurants and its own museum, is well worth exploring. The hotel atrium, often so busy with people gawping that it feels like a train station concourse, is especially striking, the sides of the building sloping into each other overhead to give the impression of being inside a narrow glassy pyramid.

In the evening, a free sound and light show, Spectra (daily 8pm & 9pm, Fri & Sat extra show at 10pm; 15min), takes place outside the hotel, with illuminated fountains and lasers. Visible from the Padang and surrounding areas, the display isn’t especially captivating unless you’re at the hotel itself.

SkyPark

Observation deck Mon–Thurs 9.30am–10pm, Fri–Sun 9.30am–11pm • S$23 • Tickets and access via the basement ticket office of tower 3, at the northern end of the complex

From what would have been an impossible vantage point, high above the sea before the creation of Marina Bay, the SkyPark’s observation deck affords superb views over Singapore’s Colonial District on one side and the conservatories of Gardens by the Bay on the other. Unfortunately tickets are overpriced and don’t allow you up close to the most famous feature, the 150m infinity pool. On the other hand, there’s no charge to visit if you eat or drink at either of the two SkyPark venues, such as Cé La Vi.

ArtScience Museum

At the northern end of the complex, close to the helix footbridge to the Singapore Flyer and Theatres on the Bay • Daily 10am–7pm • Ticket prices vary depending on the exhibition

The ArtScience Museum is easily spotted: its shape is supposed to represent a stylized lotus blossom, though from certain angles it looks more like a stubby-fingered hand. The museum aims to decode the connections between art and science, but in practice it puts on world-class travelling exhibitions, some only tenuously linked to the supposed remit: highlights to date have included items salvaged from the Titanic and the self-explanatory Harry Potter: The Exhibition. There’s only one permanent gallery, Future World, in which children (and grown-ups) can interact with colourful multimedia installations by, for example, crafting and scanning objects which then pop up in a large-scale animation.

Gardens by the Bay South

18 Marina Gardens Drive • Daily 5am–2am; conservatories 9am–9pm • Free admission; OCBC Skyway S$5; conservatories S$28; last ticket sales at 8pm • 6420 6848, gardensbythebay.com.sg • Bayfront MRT (enter via the Dragonfly Bridge)

Two vast conservatories, roofs arched like the backs of foraging dinosaurs, are the most eye-catching features of the southern section of Gardens by the Bay. Intended to be a second botanic garden for Singapore, the gardens are split into three chunks around Marina Bay; the southern area, next to Marina Bay Sands, is very much the centrepiece.

One conservatory houses Mediterranean and African flora, the highlight being the stands of bizarrely shaped baobab trees. The neighbouring conservatory nurtures cloud forest of the kind found on tropical peaks like Kinabalu, and includes a 35m “mountain” covered in ferns, rhododendrons and insect-eating butterworts.

The gardens’ other big draw is the Supertree Grove, an array of towers resembling gigantic golf tees and sheathed in a sort of red trelliswork, from which climbers, ferns and orchids poke out. More exciting by day is the slightly wobbly OCBC Skyway, an aerial walkway connecting the tops of the two tallest supertrees and providing good views. At night, though, the supertrees come into their own when they are illuminated in free light shows at 7.45pm and 8.45pm.

Red Dot Design Museum

11 Marina Boulevard • Daily 11am-2am • $6 • 6514 0111, museum.red-dog.sg • Downtown or Bayfront MRT

Housed in a futuristic glass building, the Red Dot Design Museum focuses on international product design and the creative use of illustration, following the process from conceptualization all the way through to the realized work – be it a sports car or art installation. It’s at its best during the monthly crafts market, MAAD, when local artists and designers showcase their work (3–10pm one weekend per month). The gift shop stocks quirky designer items that make good gifts.

Marina Centre

Promenade or Esplanade MRT, or City Hall MRT via the subterranean CityLink Mall

The large triangle of reclaimed land east of the Padang and the Raffles Hotel, robbing Beach Road of its beach, is officially called Marina Centre, though locals invariably invoke the names of the Marina Square or Suntec City malls when referring to it. This is the oldest part of the Marina Bay project, open since the early 1990s, but still feels quite disconnected from the historical neighbourhoods to the west.

Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay

1 Esplanade Drive • Daily 9am–late • Free; tours S$10 (45min; check online for latest schedule) • 6828 8377, esplanade.com

Opinion is split as to whether the two huge, spiked shells that roof the Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay project, just east of the Padang, are peerless modernistic architecture or indulgent kitsch. They have variously been compared to hedgehogs and even durians (the preferred description among locals), though two giant insect eyes is perhaps more apt. Facilities include a concert hall, theatres, gallery space and, on the third floor, library@esplanade, with a wide range of arts-related books and other resources. It’s possible to do a guided tour of the site, but what lures most casual visitors are the views, particularly fine at dusk, across the bay to the Financial District and Marina Bay Sands.

Singapore Flyer

30 Raffles Ave • Daily 8.30am–10pm • S$33 • 6333 3311, singaporeflyer.com

Standing a lofty 165m high, the Singapore Flyer is actually slightly taller than the summit of Bukit Timah, the island’s highest natural point, and about 30m taller than the London Eye. The downside is that from its location, the remaining rows of shophouses are largely obscured by clumps of towers; better views can be had from some hotels and rooftop bars, notably 1-Altitude.

The dollar-a-minute ride – billed as a flight – initially has you looking east over the Kallang district, home to the new Sports Hub stadium complex. Beyond the shipping lanes, Indonesia’s Riau archipelago appears very close. Looking north, it’s more exciting to pick out the golden domes of the Sultan Mosque and the shophouses of Arab Street beyond the twin Gateway buildings on Beach Road. As your capsule reaches maximum height, you might just make out the low hump of Bukit Timah, topped with a couple of radio masts, on the horizon beyond Theatres on the Bay.

The descent affords good views of Marina Bay Sands and the Financial District. Originally the ride began with these, but the wheel had to be reversed due to feng shui concerns (apparently the old direction was channelling good luck up and away from the area).

Orchard Road and around

It would be hard to conjure an image more at odds with the present reality of Orchard Road than historian Mary Turnbull’s description of “a country lane lined with bamboo hedges and shrubbery, with trees meeting overhead”. In the early part of the last century, merchants taking a constitutional here would have strolled past rows of nutmeg trees, followed at a discreet distance by their manservants. Today, the area is synonymous with shopping – huge, often glitzy malls now line the road.

Orchard Road begins as the continuation of Tanglin Road and channels traffic east for nearly 3km to Bras Basah and Selegie roads, near the Colonial District. The bucolic allure of the area of old survives 1km beyond Orchard Road’s western end, where you’ll find Singapore’s excellent Botanic Gardens.

Dhoby Ghaut

In the Dhoby Ghaut area, at the eastern end of Orchard Road, Indian dhobies (laundrymen) used to wash clothes in the Stamford Canal, which ran along Orchard and Stamford roads. Those days are long gone, though something of the past survives in the Cathay building (thecathay.com.sg), home to the company behind one of Singapore’s and Malaysia’s oldest cinema chains. Boasting a 1939 Art Deco facade, the building houses a multiplex cinema and the Cathay Gallery (Mon–Sat 11am–7pm; free), displaying memorabilia – costumes, promotional materials and vintage photos – of eight decades in the movie business, including its 1950s and 1960s heyday, when the company made its own Chinese- and Malay-language films.

The Istana

Istana and grounds only open four or five holidays a year, with a nominal entrance fee (see website for details) • istana.gov.sg • Dhoby Ghaut MRT

A short walk west along Orchard Road from Dhoby Ghautz MRT takes you past the Plaza Singapura mall, beyond which stern soldiers guard the main gate of Singapore’s Istana, built in 1869. With ornate cornices, elegant louvred shutters and a high mansard roof, the building was originally the official residence of Singapore’s British governors; now it’s home to Singapore’s president, a ceremonial role for which elections are held nonetheless. The first Sunday of the month sees a changing of the guard ceremony at the main gate at 5.45pm.

Emerald Hill

Somerset MRT

A number of architecturally noteworthy houses have survived the bulldozers at Emerald Hill, behind the Centrepoint mall and a five-minute walk west of the Istana. Granted to Englishman William Cuppage in 1845, the hill was for some years afterwards the site of a large nutmeg plantation. After his death in 1872, the land was subdivided and sold off, much of it to members of the Peranakan community. Walk up Emerald Hill Road today and you’ll see exquisite houses from the era, in the so-called Chinese Baroque style, typified by the use of coloured ceramic tiles, carved swing doors, shuttered windows and pastel-shaded walls with fine plaster mouldings. Unsurprisingly, quite a few now host trendy restaurants and bars.

ION Orchard

2 Orchard Turn • Orchard MRT

The most striking of the area’s malls, ION Orchard has a bulging glass frontage vaguely reminiscent of Theatres on the Bay, and is topped by a tower of luxury apartments that also boasts a 55th-floor viewing gallery, ION Sky (S$20).

Goodwood Park Hotel

22 Scotts Rd • Orchard MRT

A few minutes’ walk north up Scotts Road off Orchard Road stands the impressive Goodwood Park Hotel, with gleaming walls and a distinctive squat, steeple-like tower. Having started out in 1900 as the Teutonia Club for German expats, it was commandeered by the British with the outbreak of war across Europe in 1914, and didn’t open again until 1918. In 1929 it became a hotel, though by 1942 it and the Raffles – designed by the same architect – were lodging Japanese officers. The Goodwood Park was later used for war-crimes trials. Today the hotel remains one of the classiest in town and is a well-regarded venue for a British-style tea.

Botanic Gardens

1 Cluny Rd • Daily 5am–midnight • Free, with free weekend tours of some sections plus free concerts • 6471 7138, sbg.org.sg • The Tanglin gate bus #7 from Arab St area or #174 from Chinatown, both via Somerset Rd, next to Orchard Rd; Bukit Timah Rd entrance use Botanic Gardens MRT

Singapore has long made green space an integral part of the island’s landscape, but none of its parks come close to matching the refinement of the Botanic Gardens, the island’s sole UNESCO World Heritage Site. Founded in 1859, the gardens were where the Brazilian seeds that gave rise to the great rubber plantations of the Malay Peninsula were first nurtured in 1877. Henry Ridley, named the gardens’ director the following year, recognized the financial potential of rubber and spent the next twenty years persuading plantation-owners to convert to this new crop, an obsession that earned him the nickname “Mad” Ridley. In later years the gardens became a centre for the breeding of new orchid hybrids. Recent additions have extended the park all the way north to Bukit Timah Road, where the Botanic Gardens MRT station offers a route to the newer, less interesting part of the gardens; the itinerary that follows assumes the classic approach up Tanglin and Napier roads to the Tanglin gate at the start of Cluny Road.

Into the gardens

The path from the Tanglin gate, lined with frangipanis, casuarinas and the odd majestic banyan tree, soon reaches the tranquil Swan Lake, nearly as old as the gardens themselves. Veer to the left and you reach the newest additions to the gardens, the Walk of Giants (a tree-canopy elevated walkway) with a wetland area at the far end. Both are still bedding down, so it’s more interesting to keep to the right side of the lake, following signs for the ginger garden, packed with flowering gingers as exotic and gaudy as anything you could hope to see in the tropics.

National Orchid Garden

Daily 8.30am–7pm; last admission 6pm • S$5

A feast of blooms of almost every hue are on show at the National Orchid Garden. There’s an entire section of orchids named after dignitaries and celebrities who have visited; Dendrobium Margaret Thatcher is a severe pink with a couple of petals twisted like pasta spirals, while Vandaenopsis Nelson Mandela is a reassuring warm yellowy-brown. Looking slightly out of place is the black-and-white Burkill Hall, exemplifying the so-called Tropical Tudor style, few examples of which now survive in Singapore; the gardens’ director once lived here. The gift shop at the exit stocks an incredible range of orchid paraphernalia, including blossoms encased in glass paperweights or plated with gold.

Back to the Tanglin gate

Exiting the orchid garden, head up the boardwalk to enter the central rainforest with a trail past numbered highlights, including a spectacular banyan tree that’s a mass of aerial roots. The trail and forest end above Symphony Lake, where occasional concerts are staged.

By now you’ve seen much of the best of what the gardens have to offer, and there’s not that much to be gained by continuing north. Heading back towards the Tanglin gate, look out for the park’s loftiest tree, a stunning 47m jelawai on the edge of the rainforest tract; this and several other exceptionally tall trees are fitted with lightning conductors. Close by, to the right, is one of the loveliest spots in all of Singapore, a grassy area centred upon a 1930s bandstand, encircled by eighteen rain trees for shade.

Head downhill from here through the sundial garden to end up back at the lake, or bear left to reach Holttum Hall – only a couple of minutes’ walk from the Tanglin gate – a 1920s house that hosts a museum of the gardens’ history.

North to Bukit Timah Road

Continue northwards from Symphony Lake, and you soon reach the Visitor Centre – marooned in the middle of the gardens – with a gift shop and café. Next comes the Evolution Garden, where fake petrified trees help to illustrate how plant life has evolved over millennia. From here, it’s several minutes’ walk through the bougainvillea and bamboo garden to reach the MRT station.

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Central Catchment Nature Reserve

For a taste of Singapore’s wilder side, head to the Central Catchment Nature Reserve (informally known as the “Central Nature Reserve”). The lush heart of the island is dominated by rainforest and several large reservoirs, and there are opportunities for hikes up Bukit Timah, the island’s tallest hill. The interest isn’t limited to the jungle though: close to Bukit Timah, the Former Ford Factory is a museum housed in the building where the British surrendered to the Japanese, while the northern end of the nature reserve holds Singapore’s highly regarded zoo, with a separate Night Safari section open from dusk, and the zoo’s newest offshoot, the River Safari, presenting the fauna of rivers as diverse as the Mekong and the Mississippi.

Bukit Timah

Bukit Timah Road shoots northwest from Little India, passing leafy suburbs en route to Johor Bahru (it was the main road to the Causeway until superseded by the Bukit Timah Expressway). Some 9km on from Little India, the road becomes Upper Bukit Timah Road and arrives at Bukit Timah itself, often called “Bukit Timah Hill” by locals – a deliberate tautology as the surrounding district is also known as Bukit Timah.

Bukit Timah Nature Reserve

Hindhede Drive • Daily 7am–7pm; exhibition hall 8.30am–5pm • Free • nparks.gov.sg • Beauty World MRT, then a short walk north up Upper Bukit Timah Rd

One of Singapore’s last pockets of primary dipterocarp forest can be experienced in the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, established in 1883 by Nathaniel Cantley, then superintendent of the Botanic Gardens. Wildlife abounded in this part of Singapore in the mid-nineteenth century, when the natural historian Alfred Russel Wallace came here to do fieldwork; he later observed that “in all my subsequent travels in the East I rarely if ever met with so productive a spot”. Wallace also noted the presence of tiger traps, but by the 1930s Singapore’s tigers had met their end. Long-tailed macaques haven’t dwindled, however; some can be seen wandering around the houses at the base of the hill peeking in bins for food.

The trails

Don’t expect a full-blown jungle-trekking experience, as the four colour-coded trails consist largely of family-friendly boardwalks, steps and stretches of proper road. Three share a very steep start up a sealed road; the exception, the green trail, meanders along the side of the hill before rejoining the others. Most people tackle the red trail (30min), which is the road up to the summit at a paltry 164m; a flight of narrow steps halfway along – the Summit Path – offers a shortcut to the top.

Former Ford Factory

351 Upper Bukit Timah Rd • Mon–Sat 9am–5.30pm, Sun noon–5.30pm • S$3 • 6462 6724, nas.gov.sg/formerfordfactory • Hillview MRT, then backtrack three bus stops on southbound bus #67, #170, #171 or #184

The Art Deco Former Ford Factory at Bukit Timah was the first car-making plant of its kind in Southeast Asia when it opened in October 1941. But in early 1942 the Japanese invaded, and on February 15 Lieutenant General Percival, head of the Allied forces in Singapore, surrendered to Japan’s General Yamashita in the factory’s boardroom. Today the scene is recreated as part of a worthwhile museum focused on the occupation and, less successfully, its aftermath and the beginnings of decolonization. Being run by Singapore’s National Archives service, it leans heavily on documents and ephemera – everything from Japanese textbooks and the notorious wartime “banana money” (bananas were depicted on one Japanese-issued banknote) to sketches by POWs at Changi and watercolours commissioned by the occupying administration.

Singapore Zoo

80 Mandai Lake Rd • 6269 3411, zoo.com.sg • Bus #138 from Ang Mo Kio MRT, #927 from Choa Chu Kang MRT or the special Mandai Express bus from Khatib MRT (daily 9am–7pm; every 40min; 1hr; S$1); slightly faster private buses to/from downtown available, details at safarigate.com and saex.com.sg

Singapore’s main wildlife attractions cluster in woodland around the tranquil Seletar reservoir: the Singapore Zoo and its offshoots, Night Safari and River Safari, which will be joined in the early 2020s by a rainforest park and resort, as well as the Bird Park being relocated from Jurong. They consistently draw crowds, which is partly down to their “open” policy: many animals are kept in spacious, naturalistic enclosures behind moats, though creatures such as big cats still have to be caged.

The zoo

Daily 8.30am–6pm • S$33 • See zoo.com.sg for details of combination tickets including Night Safari, River Safari or Jurong Bird Park

Home to more than 300 species, the zoo could easily occupy you for half a day if not longer. A tram ($5) does a one-way circuit of the grounds, but as it won’t always be going your way, be prepared for some legwork.

Highlights include the Fragile Forest biodome, a magical zone where you can actually walk among ring-tailed lemurs, sloths and fruit bats, and Frozen Tundra featuring, naturally enough, polar bears. The white tigers are a big draw too, not actually white but resembling Siamese cats in the colour of their fur and eyes. Primates are something of a strong point, too: orang-utans swing through the trees overhead close to the entrance, and at the Great Rift Valley zone you can espy the communal life of a hundred Hamadryas baboons, including some rather unchivalrous behaviour on the part of males, who bite females to rein them in. There are animal shows and feeding displays throughout the day, too.

Night Safari

Daily 7.15pm–midnight; shops/restaurants from 6pm; last admission 11pm • S$45 • See zoo.com.sg for details of combination tickets including zoo, River Safari or Jurong Bird Park

Many animals are nocturnal, and the Night Safari presents them so well that you’ll wonder why similar establishments aren’t everywhere. It’s true that the Borneo-style tribal show at the entrance is tacky, and there can be queues for the free tram tours (40min), but these are mere niggles at what is the most popular strand of the zoo.

The trams take you around two-thirds of the site. You can forgo them and simply walk around the leafy grounds – an atmospheric experience in the muted lighting. But if you do this, you’ll miss out on some enclosures, notably those for large mammals such as elephants and hippos, and the Indo-Malayan trail, featuring Asiatic black bears and an artificial waterfall. Areas you can only visit on foot include the Fishing Cat Trail, with the binturong, sometimes called the bearcat (you’ll understand why when you see it); and the Leopard Trail, where you may spot the clouded leopard and slow loris.

It’s worth catching the Creatures of the Night show (hourly 7.30–9.30pm, plus Fri & Sat 10.30pm; free), which touches on the importance of conservation and recycling, and stars otters, raccoons, civets and owls, among others.

River Safari

Daily 10am–7pm • S$30; Amazon River Quest and River Safari Cruise each S$5 • See zoo.com.sg for details of combination tickets including zoo, Night Safari or Jurong Bird Park

The River Safari spans the divide between aquarium and zoo, trying to do justice to the fauna of seven of the world’s great rivers and the lands they flow through. There are too many tanks for comfort at the start, presenting badgers, various alligators and crocs, catfish and other creatures of the Congo, Mississippi, Ganges, Nile and Mekong. Much better is the hangar-like Giant Panda Forest, housing two giant pandas and the raccoon-like red panda, with white ears and a stripy orange tail. The second half of the park is given over almost entirely to what’s billed as Amazonia, and much of that is taken up by one 10min ride, the so-so Amazon River Quest, in which your “boat” is carried along a sluiceway past enclosures of scarlet ibises and spider monkeys, among others. Saved for last is the most humongous tank of all: the Amazon Flooded Forest, home to manatees, giant arapaima fish, otters and piranhas.

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Kranji and Sungei Buloh

While land reclamation has radically altered the east coast and industrialization the west, the northern expanses of the island up to the Straits of Johor still retain pockets of the rainforest and mangrove swamp that blanketed Singapore on Raffles’ arrival in 1819. Though thickets of state housing blocks are never far away, something of rural Singapore’s agricultural past clings on by way of the odd prawn- or poultry-farm or vegetable garden. Two sights make it worth considering coming this far: the Kranji War Cemetery and Memorial, and the wetland reserve at Sungei Buloh.

Kranji War Cemetery

9 Woodlands Rd • Daily 7am–6.30pm • Free • cwgc.org • Kranji MRT then a 10min walk, bus #170 from opposite Little India MRT/Bukit Timah, or #927 from the zoo to the junction of Woodlands and Mandai rds and a 15min walk north

Kranji War Cemetery is the resting place of many Allied troops who died in the defence of Singapore. Row upon row of graves slope up the manicured hill, some identified only as “known unto God”. Beyond the simple stone cross that stands over the cemetery is the memorial, around which are recorded the names of more than twenty thousand soldiers (including personnel from Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Malaya and South Asia) who died in this region during World War II. Two unassuming tombs stand on the wide lawns below the cemetery, belonging to Yusof bin Ishak and Dr B.H. Sheares, independent Singapore’s first two presidents.

Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve

301 Neo Tiew Crescent • Daily 7am–7pm; guided tours Sat 9.30am • Free • 6794 1401, nparks.gov.sg • Bus #925 from Kranji or Choa Chu Kang MRT to the Kranji reservoir car park, then a 15min walk; on Sun the bus becomes #925C from Kranji MRT and goes direct

A coastal reservoir runs through the western part of Kranji, beyond which is the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve, the island’s only nature park of its kind. Expanses of mangrove and mud flats are crisscrossed by embanked trails and walkways, with views across the strait to Johor Bahru. The vegetation rapidly gets monotonous, but then birdlife is the main reason to come. There’s a reasonable chance of spotting sandpipers, egrets and kingfishers, and between September and March, migratory birds from around Asia roost and feed here, especially in the early morning. Several hides dot the landscape, and you can get an elevated view over the reserve from the tallest of them, the oversized-treehouse-like Aerie. It’s worth gazing down at the creeks, too, harbouring mudskippers, banded archerfish – which clobber insect prey by squirting water at them with their mouths – and even the occasional saltwater crocodile.

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Geylang and Katong

The eastern suburbs of Geylang and Katong may seem mundane at first sight, but both have deep roots and character of the sort absent from the island’s new towns. Malay culture has held sway here since the mid-nineteenth century, when Malays and Indonesians arrived to work first in the local copra (dried coconut kernel) processing factory and later on its serai (lemon grass) farms. The eastern part of Geylang, called Geylang Serai, retains quite a strong Malay feel and is worth checking out for Malay food or merchandise, though there are no specific sights. Katong was once a beachfront district popular with the wealthy, including many Peranakans, who built their villas here in prewar times. That Peranakan heritage lives on to some degree, and provides the main lure for visitors. You can sample what both districts have to offer by heading south from Geylang Serai to Katong via Joo Chiat Road, as described here.

Geylang Serai

Paya Lebar MRT, then a short walk south and east, or bus #2 or #51 (from Chinatown) and #7 (from the Botanic Gardens and Orchard Rd), which pass through Victoria St and will drop you on Sims Ave, the main eastbound drag

Geylang has acquired a certain notoriety as something of a red-light district. Arrive by bus, and you’ll spot numerous numbered lorongs (lanes) on the way, mainly to the right of Sims Avenue; brothels along them are recognizable by the coloured lights outside. But Geylang is also home to the recently rebuilt Geylang Serai Market, which is very much the focus of the area’s Malay life. A two-storey complex, it’s easily spotted on the side of Sims Avenue, with sloping roofs reminiscent of certain styles of kampung house. The stalls are predominantly Malay, selling textiles, kuih (sweetmeats) and snacks such as rempeyek, delicious fried flour rounds encrusted with spices and peanuts.

Joo Chiat Road

Languid Joo Chiat Road is where Geylang shades into Katong, the latter now a middle-class residential area, though a little of the former’s seediness spills over here after dark. The 1.5km stroll southeast into Katong proper at East Coast Road is hardly a chore thanks to several distractions, including some old businesses amid ever fancier shops.

At the northern end of the road, opposite the Geylang Serai market, the Joo Chiat Complex has a notable Malay/Islamic feel, the shops selling batik, rugs and silk, Malay music CDs and jamu – assorted herbal remedies. Occasionally a stage is set up behind for people to partake of impromptu bouts of old-fangled joget dancing.

At no. 252, Chiang Pow Joss Paper Trading produces funerary paraphernalia in one of several nicely restored shophouses on the road, while Nam San at no. 261 makes mackerel otah-otah, a kind of dumpling. Just beyond, the immaculate Peranakan shophouses on Koon Seng Road (on the left) are the architectural highlight of the area, with their restored multicoloured facades, French windows, eaves and mouldings. At no. 320, peek through the 1960s louvred windows at the workaday Ann Tin Tong Medical Hall, a world away from Chinatown’s slick herbalists. Teong Theng, at no. 369, sells attractive rattan furniture and accessories, popular in Singapore homes a generation ago but now almost totally out of favour.

Katong

Bus #12 from Lavender MRT, or #14 from Dhoby Ghaut MRT; both call at Mountbatten MRT en route

From the Koon Seng Road intersection, Joo Chiat Road runs 600m on to East Coast Road. The beach hinted at by that name has long since gone – pushed further south by the creation of the East Coast Park on several kilometres of reclaimed land. However, the area is worth visiting thanks to a pocket of outlets celebrating its Peranakan traditions – it’s not hard to find places serving Nyonya food, and there’s Rumah Bebe at 113 East Coast Rd, selling clothing and jewellery.

Katong Antiques House

208 East Coast Rd • Tues–Sun 11am–5pm • Optional tours S$15 per person • 6345 8544

East of the junction with Joo Chiat Road is the Katong Antiques House, whose owner, Peter Wee, is a veteran spokesman for the Peranakan community. He has amassed a treasure trove of artefacts, from wedding costumes to vintage furniture and, more prosaically, old books in Baba Malay, a blend of Malay and Hokkien Chinese. He can give you a tour (book in advance) of the traditionally decorated shophouse, which – as with all such buildings –stretches on for a surprising distance behind the narrow facade.

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Changi

Even in the 1970s, eastern Singapore still looked the way the outskirts of some Malaysian towns do today, dotted with kampungs, low-rise housing estates and coconut palms. It’s hard to visualize that landscape as you scoot out through new towns like Bedok (once a quiet seaside suburb) on the way to Changi, at the eastern tip of the island. The main reason to head this far east is to see Changi Museum, commemorating the internment of Allied troops and civilians by the Japanese during World War II. In the Singaporean consciousness, Changi has long embodied a beachside idyll; just a bit further afield from the museum is the beach, great for a dip or bask on a hot day.

Changi Museum

1000 Upper Changi Rd North • Daily 9.30am–5pm • Free; audio guides S$8 • 6214 2451, changimuseum.sg • Tanah Merah or Upper Changi MRT, then a 15–20min ride on bus #2

Changi Prison was the site of an infamous World War II POW camp, where Japanese jailers subjected Allied prisoners, civilians included, to the harshest of treatment. Those brutalities are movingly remembered in the Changi Museum – which was once housed within the prison itself, but later moved wholesale just up the road when the prison was extended.

Novelist James Clavell drew on his experience of Changi in King Rat: “the stench was nauseating… stench from a generation of confined human bodies”, he wrote. The museum does a reasonable job of picking over the facts of the Japanese occupation and the conditions prisoners endured. Memorable exhibits include artworks by internees, with pride of place given to reproductions of Stanley Warren’s so-called Changi Murals, depicting New Testament scenes (the originals are housed within an army camp nearby, where Warren was held). Towards the end, there’s a recreation of an improvised theatre where internees put on entertainments to amuse fellow inmates.

In the museum courtyard is a simple wooden chapel, typical of those erected in Singapore’s wartime camps; the brass cross on its altar was crafted from spent ammunition casings. The messages on its board of remembrance are often touching and worth a read (ask staff for pen and notepaper to add your own).

Changi Point and the beach

Bus #2 from Tanah Merah MRT to Changi Point, or #19 from Tampines East MRT to the beach

Beyond Changi Prison, the tower blocks thin out and the landscape becomes a patchwork of fields, often a relic of colonial-era military bases still used by Singapore’s forces. Ten minutes on via the #2 bus is the coast at Changi Point, with a cluster of eating places and shops called Changi Village, mainly serving the beach-going public.

Just beyond the #2 bus terminus is the beach, reached by a footbridge over a canalized inlet. Once you’re past a stretch of manicured grass and trees, you’ll reach a narrow strip of brownish sand fronting greenish-blue water – actually not uninviting (unless you were expecting something out of coastal Terengganu). The sight of aircraft rumbling in low every few minutes on the Changi flight path soon ceases to be a distraction.

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The Southern Ridges and Pasir Panjang

While no less endowed with new towns and industrial estates than the east of the island, western Singapore retains a leafier, more open feel. An unusually verdant example of this is at the Southern Ridges, an umbrella term for the coastal ridge that runs 9km northwest from the southern tip of the island. The ridge is lined by parks and greenery, and the whole thing can be walked using a series of ingenious footbridges and walkways.

Two minor attractions en route are Reflections at Bukit Chandu, a museum commemorating the wartime defence of that hill by Singapore’s Malay Regiment; and Mount Faber, with views over downtown Singapore and cable-car rides across to Sentosa Island. Down on the coast, Pasir Panjang, once a sleepy district of kampungs and still a relatively quiet residential area, is home to the entertainingly tacky Buddhist theme park of Haw Par Villa.

The account here takes the Southern Ridges in an easterly direction, ending at Harbourfront MRT beneath Mount Faber – a sensible choice as this avoids a steep climb up the hill and allows you to finish at the massive VivoCity mall, which has plenty of places for refreshment. Haw Par Villa is really an optional extra as far as the walk is concerned. The links between parks on the walk often offer little shade, so be assiduous about sun protection and bring a reasonable supply of water.

Haw Par Villa

262 Pasir Panjang Rd • Daily 9am–7pm • Free • 6872 2780 • Haw Par Villa MRT

Delightfully unmodernized, Haw Par Villa is an unexpected star among Singapore’s lesser-known sights. Featuring a gaudy parade of statues of people and creatures from Chinese myth and legend, it was once the estate of the brothers Aw, Boon Haw and Boon Par, who made a fortune early in the last century selling Tiger Balm – a cure-all ointment their father devised. The grounds held their villa and private zoo, but when the British wanted to license the owning of large animals the brothers ditched the zoo for statuary; the park then gained a new moniker, a mishmash of the brothers’ names.

The main path curls up and around a hill past one kitsch tableau after another. One of the best shows titanic combat as the Eight Immortals of Taoist mythology attack the Dragon King’s undersea palace. Elsewhere, look out for a curious folkloric scene in which a deer and a goat, the latter talking into a bakelite telephone, take tea with a rabbit and a rat, who are newlyweds.

The centrepiece, housed in its own tunnel, is the Ten Courts of Hell. Here, tax dodgers and late rent-payers are pictured being “pounded with a stone mallet”, while prostitutes are drowned in the “filthy blood pool”; in one tableau someone appears to be being gored to death by a giant brush. Finally, the dead are shown having their memories wiped by drinking a cup of “magic tea” prior to reincarnation.

Reflections at Bukit Chandu

31k Pepys Rd • Tues–Sun 9am–5.30pm • Free • 6375 2510, nhb.gov.sg • Pasir Panjang MRT, then a 10min walk north uphill

The defence of Pasir Panjang against the Japanese by the 1st and 2nd Battalion of the Malay Regiment is remembered at the tiny Reflections at Bukit Chandu museum. It’s housed in a lone colonial building that once served as officer accommodation, though it became a food and munitions store during the war. Here “C” company of the Malay Regiment’s second battalion made a brave stand against the Japanese on February 13, 1942 – two days before the British capitulation – and sustained heavy casualties.

There’s nothing special about the small collection of artefacts focusing on this event, though the displays do bring home the human toll of the conflict, as well as highlighting British ambivalence about working with the Malays: the regiment was begun as an experiment to see “how the Malays would react to military discipline”, and only when they proved themselves were members sent to Singapore for further training.

The canopy walk

Bear left along the ridge from the Reflections at Bukit Chandu for your first taste of the Southern Ridges trail; it also happens to be where the canopy walk begins. Soaring above the actual trail, the walkway takes you east through the treetops, with signs pointing out common Singapore trees such as cinnamon and tembusu, and views north across rolling grassy landscapes, the odd mansion poking out from within clumps of mature trees. After just a few minutes, the walkway rejoins the trail leading downhill to some nurseries and the west gate of the rather mundane Hort Park on Alexandra Road.

From Alexandra Arch to Mount Faber

The Alexandra Road end of Hort Park is very close to one of the huge, purpose-built footbridges on the Southern Ridges trail, the white Alexandra Arch, which is meant to resemble a leaf. On the bridge’s east side, a long, elevated metal walkway zigzags off into the distance; it’s called the forest walk, though it passes through nothing denser than mature woodland on its kilometre-long journey east. The walkway zigzags even more as it rises steeply to the top of Telok Blangah Hill, whose park offers good views of Mount Faber and Sentosa Island to the southeast.

Proceed downhill, following signs for Henderson Waves, and after 750m you will come to a vast footbridge of wooden slats over metal. High up in the air over broad Henderson Road, the bridge has undulating parapets – its “Waves” – containing built-in shelters against the sun or rain.

Mount Faber

On the east side of Henderson Waves and north of the VivoCity mall • Free • 6377 9688, nparks.gov.sg • A stiff walk up from Harbourfront MRT

In bygone years, leafy Mount Faber, named in 1845 after government engineer Captain Charles Edward Faber, was a favourite recreation spot for its views over downtown. These days, you’ll have to look out for breaks in the dense foliage for vistas over Bukit Merah new town to Chinatown and the Financial District, or head to the one of the restaurants at the very summit. The complex is also the departure point for the deluxe cable car to the HarbourFront Centre and on to Sentosa Island. To descend, follow signs for the Marang trail, which eventually leads down a steep flight of steps on the south side of the hill to VivoCity, with the HarbourFront Centre next door.

HarbourFront Centre and VivoCity

Harbourfront MRT

On Telok Blangah Road, the HarbourFront Centre is nothing more than a glorified ferry terminal from where boats set off for Indonesia’s Riau archipelago, as well as a departure point for cable cars heading to Mount Faber and Sentosa Island. Much more worthwhile is the VivoCity mall, housing three good food courts (in particular Food Republic on level 3), a slew of restaurants, a cinema and other amenities; from here Sentosa is just a 10min walk away.

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Jurong and Tuas

Occupying a sizeable slab of southwestern Singapore, sprawling Jurong was notoriously dubbed “Goh’s folly” in the 1960s when Goh Keng Swee, then the finance minister, decided it was vital to create a major industrial town here on unpromising swampy terrain. To the surprise of not just the avowed sceptics, the new town took off, and today the area, including neighbouring Tuas, boasts a diverse portfolio of industries, including pharmaceuticals and oil refining – in which Singapore is a world leader despite having nary a drop of black gold of its own. Jurong has two significant attractions, the extensive avian zoo that is the Jurong Bird Park, plus the Singapore Science Centre – but both will move come the early 2020s, when large parts of the town will be remodelled partly to receive the future high-speed rail link with KL.

Jurong Bird Park

2 Jurong Hill (until the early 2020s, when the park will move north to sit alongside the zoo) • Daily 8.30am–6pm • S$29; see website for details of combination tickets including zoo, Night Safari or River Safari • 6265 0022, birdpark.com.sg • Boon Lay MRT, then bus #194; heading back, catch the bus from the stop where you arrived

Lining Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim, the Jurong Bird Park is home to one of the world’s biggest bird collections. You’ll need at least a couple of hours to have a good look around the grounds, though you can save a little time using the park’s trams ($5).

Besides the four expansive walk-in aviaries, described here, the park also has a number of worthwhile smaller enclosures, such as the hugely popular Penguin Coast (feeding times 10.30am & 3.30pm). Just inside the entrance, it juxtaposes half a dozen penguin species against the backdrop of a mock Portuguese galleon, designed to evoke the sighting of penguins by explorers such as Vasco da Gama. The park also puts on various bird shows, the most exciting being Kings of the Skies (daily 10am & 4pm), in which eagles, hawks, falcons and owls show off their predatory capabilities.

The walk-in aviaries

While not the most impressive of the major aviaries, the Southeast Asian Birds section makes seeing local birdlife far easier than overnighting in a hide in Taman Negara; you’ll find fairy bluebirds and other small but delightful creatures feasting on papaya slices, with a simulated thunderstorm at midday. Close by are Jungle Jewels, featuring South American birdlife in “forest” surroundings, and the Lory Loft, a giant aviary under netting, packed with multicoloured, chattering lories and lorikeets amid foliage meant to simulate the Australian bush. At the far end of the park is the Waterfall Aviary, long the park’s pride. It boasts a 30m cascade and 1500 winged inhabitants, including carmine bee-eaters and South African crowned cranes.

Singapore Science Centre

15 Science Centre Rd; check online for 2020 location • Daily 10am–6pm • S$12 • 6425 2500, science.edu.sg • Jurong East MRT, then a 10min walk or bus #66 or #335

Interactivity is the watchword at the Singapore Science Centre, on the eastern edge of the parkland around the artificial Jurong Lake. Galleries here hold hundreds of hands-on displays focusing on genetics, space science and other disciplines, allowing you to understand fire, test your ability to hear high-pitched sounds and be befuddled by optical illusions. It goes down well with the kids on school outings, who sweep around the place in deafening waves.

Omni-Theatre

21 Jurong Town Hall Rd • Films daily noon–8pm; observatory Fri 7.45–10pm • S$14; observatory free • 6425 2500, omnitheatre.com.sg

Just north of the Science Centre but under the same management, the Omni-Theatre shows IMAX movies about the natural world, and houses an observatory that does free stargazing sessions on Fridays. Being almost on the equator, Singapore enjoys views of both the northern and southern skies, though light pollution and puffy clouds can put a dampener on things.

Tiger Brewery

459 Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim • Tours Mon-Fri 10am–5pm, Sat 1–5pm (see website for tour schedule) • S$20 • 6860 3005, tigerbrewerytour.com.sg • Tuas West Road MRT, then bus #192 or a 10min walk northeast up Tuas Ave 12

Tiger is undoubtedly one of Singapore’s best-known brands internationally, brewed here since 1931 as a joint venture between Heineken and a local drinks manufacturer. The German giants Beck’s soon set up a brewery to produce a rival, Anchor, but Tiger’s parent company acquired the upstart. In 1990 the firm became Asia Pacific Breweries and moved into its present plant in Tuas, where it produces Tiger beer as well as Guinness and other beverages. Tours take in a mini museum and let you see the space-age brewing, canning and bottling halls, before you indulge in some free quaffing in the sizeable bar, down out like an old-fashioned pub.

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Sentosa Island

S$1 • 1800 736 8672, sentosa.com.sg • Harbourfront MRT, then a 10min walk using the Sentosa Boardwalk footbridge from the VivoCity mall.

Nearly forty years of rampant development have transformed Sentosa Island into the most built-up of Singapore’s southern islands, so it’s ironic that its name means “tranquil” in Malay. The island has certainly come a long way since World War II, when it was a British military base and known as Pulau Blakang Mati (“Island of Death Behind”). Contrived but enjoyable in parts, Sentosa today is a hybrid of resort island and theme park, with Resorts World on its northern shore as the showpiece attraction – incorporating a Universal Studios theme park, a fabulous aquarium and casino. Just about every patch of Sentosa that isn’t a beach, hotel, golf course or a home for the super-rich is a diversion of some kind, ranging from a Merlion replica whose inside you can walk around to a vertical wind tunnel that replicates the sensation of skydiving. The selection here covers a few of the more interesting and sensibly priced offerings.

If you want to visit, avoid the weekends and school breaks unless you don’t mind the place being positively overrun, with long waits to get into the main sights. Booking tickets in advance is a good idea, not only to save time lining up but also because discounts may be available and some attractions can sell out on certain days.

Sentosa’s cable cars

Eight-seater cable cars, each with glittering lighting inside and out, shuttle between Mount Faber and Imbiah Lookout on Sentosa Island (daily 8.45am–10pm; S$29, day pass S$39), calling at the HarbourFront Centre en route. The best time for views is at dusk, when you see Singapore lighting up from Jurong in the west to the Financial District closer by, to the northeast. The service has recently been complemented by a new branch line within Sentosa, from near the Imbiah station to Siloso Point (for Fort Siloso; same times; S$13 or free with day pass). For more details and prices of tickets valid on both lines, see onefabergroup.com.

Resorts World Sentosa

Close to Waterfront station on the island’s north shore • 6577 8888, rwsentosa.com

The Resorts World Sentosa casino development looks plastic, like something out of a Silicon Valley corporate headquarters, but it boasts some of Sentosa’s biggest attractions.

Universal Studios Singapore

Resorts World Sentosa • Daily 10am–6 or 7pm • S$74 or S$100 with S.E.A. Aquarium; many rides have minimum height requirements and may not be suitable for young children

The ersatz character of Resorts World becomes rather entertaining at the Universal Studios theme park, where fairy-tale castles and American cityscapes rear bizarrely into view in the sultry heat. The park is divided into seven themed zones, encompassing everything from ancient Egypt – the least convincing of the lot – to DreamWorks’ animated hit Madagascar. Standard tickets offer unlimited rides, but there’s much more to do than get flung around on cutting-edge roller coasters or, in the case of the Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure, on a circular yellow raft. Street performers regularly strut their stuff, and one particularly memorable special-effects show creates an indoor hurricane.

from top National Orchid Garden; National Gallery

The S.E.A. Aquarium and Maritime Experiential Museum

Resorts World Sentosa • Daily 10am–7pm • S$38

The wonderful S.E.A. Aquarium showcases the marine life of the sea trade route between China, India and the Middle East. Visitors first pass through the Maritime Experiential Museum, focused on the history of that very same maritime route. By the time you read this, the museum should be reopen after a secretive revamp, but the highlight should remain the Jewel of Muscat, a recreation of a ninth-century Arab dhow. The boat was built without nails (coconut fibre binds the timbers), and was a gift to Singapore from Oman in 2010. Delivery took 68 days – under sail, of course.

The aquarium

Awe-inspiring in its ambition and scale, the aquarium has tanks covering ten habitats, arranged in a long loop. If you see it in the intended direction, things begin with a fine evocation of a shipwreck swarming with schools of Southeast Asian fish, including mottled honeycomb stingrays. The Southeast Asian theme continues in the next section, with an 8m-tall cylindrical coral garden, but both these tanks pale in comparison to the monster Ocean Gallery halfway through. Some 36m long, with walls 70cm thick, it’s so vast that two restaurants and several hotel suites have their own vistas onto it. Here you can watch mindboggling shoals of tiny, silvery fish moving in unison, while manta rays, goliath groupers and sharks sweep through. Elsewhere, look out for the fabulous collection of jellyfish, some glowing as if part of a lava lamp thanks to coloured lighting.

Adventure Cove Waterpark

Resorts World Sentosa, a 2min walk beyond the Maritime Experiential Museum • Daily 10am–6pm • S$38

The Adventure Cove Waterpark is the best water-themed play park in Singapore, and by no means just for kids. The magic ingredient is actual sea life: Rainbow Reef lets you snorkel in the presence of thousands of fish, while at Adventure River you float down a channel past surreal marine-themed statues, ending up inside a glass tunnel within an aquarium tank, where the fish gawp at you drifting by. Of the rides and slides, Riptide Rocket is the star, a roller coaster which magnetically hoists passengers’ dinghies on the upward legs.

Crane Dance

North shore of Resorts World Sentosa, close to the aquarium • Daily 8pm (10min) • Free

Sentosa isn’t much of a night-time destination, but if you linger after sunset, you may want to catch either Wings of Time or Crane Dance. The latter features the computer-manipulated courtship of two enormous mechanical birds accompanied by fireworks and dazzling lighting and water effects. To help you decide whether to hang around for it, search for the whole shebang on YouTube.

Madame Tussauds

Imbiah Lookout • Mon–Fri 10am–7.30pm (last admission 6pm), Sat & Sun 10am–9pm (last admission 7.30pm) • S$39; book online for discounts • 6715 4000, madametussauds.com/singapore • Imbiah station

Inevitably, the Madame Tussauds waxwork franchise has fetched up in Singapore, its seventh opening in Asia. There are a sprinkling of local and East Asian figures, including Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh, amid the usual cast of celebrities from the worlds of showbiz and sport. Its unique feature, however, is a magical illuminated boat ride down a fake river, past miniaturized Singapore scenes such as Gardens by the Bay, an Indian temple gopuram and a Chinese opera. From there, it heads on to Images of Singapore Live, which covers Singapore history using a mixture of life-sized dioramas and costumed actors.

Luge and Skyride

Daily 10am–9.30pm • S$23 for two circuits • 6274 0472, skylineluge.com • Beach station for Skyride, Imbiah station for Luge

Surprisingly good fun, the Skyride, akin to a ski lift, takes you up the hill behind Siloso Beach, after which you ride your Luge – a sort of small, unmotorized go-kart – and coast down one of several curving tracks back to your starting point.

Megazip Adventure Park

A 5min walk west of Imbiah station • Daily 11am–7pm • S$45 for main zip line • 6884 5602, megazip.com.sg

Megazip is a zip-line or flying-fox ride, in which you slide, suspended from a steel cable, from a hilltop down to an islet beyond Siloso Beach. Other offerings include an obstacle course that’s all ropes and netting, and a climbing wall.

Watersports on Sentosa

Two places at Siloso Beach offer a range of often pricey watersports. Near the start of the beach, Ola Beach Club (6265 5966, olabeachclub.com) has everything from kayaking (S$25 per hour) to a water-based jetpack – like something out of a sci-fi movie – that allows you to hover several metres above the sea (S$228). Just 200m on at Wavehouse (6238 1196, wavehousesentosa.org), there’s surfing on artificial waves in two tanks, one with a flat sheet of water suitable for beginners (daily at least noon–9pm; from S$35 per hour), the other with a barrel-shaped wave for more advanced surfers (Mon, Wed & Fri–Sun; S$30 for 30min).

AJ Hackett Sentosa

Siloso Beach, a 5min walk west of Beach station • Mon–Thurs 11am–7pm, Fri 11am–10pm, Sat 10am–10pm, Sun 10am–7pm • S$200 for bungy jump • 6911 3070, ajhackett.com/sentosa

New Zealand bungy pioneer A J Hackett has finally arrived in Singapore with a 50m bungy tower – actually two towers, linked by a narrow bridge meant as a challenge for people with a fear of heights. You can also pay to stride down the side of one of the towers (harnessed, of course), and there are also two massive swing rides to choose from.

Fort Siloso

At the northwest tip of the island, beyond Siloso Beach • Daily 10am–6pm • Free • 6736 8672 • Bus A from Beach station

Sentosa’s one bona fide historical attraction is the sprawling Fort Siloso, which guarded Singapore’s western approaches from the 1880s onwards; today, though, only uniformed dummies man the observation posts and gun emplacements. The Surrender Chambers are the focus, re-enacting the British and Japanese surrenders of 1942 and 1945, respectively, using waxwork figures. Other chambers offer a deeper analysis of British military failings in the region than anything at the National Museum, although the history can be confused: some panels spin the old story that Singapore’s guns were pointing the wrong way as they were meant to deter a naval attack from the south, while others present the revisionist idea that the guns could turn to fire northwards, but were ineffective. Oddly, Japanese labelling is almost ubiquitous, as if sending a none-too-subtle “don’t try that again” message.

Wings of Time

At the start of Siloso Beach • Daily 7.40pm & 8.40pm; 25min • S$18 • wingsoftime.com.sg • Beach station

The minority of visitors who hang around Sentosa after dusk are either heading to one of the beach bars or to Wings of Time, a kids’ fable cast as a lavish sound-and-light show, featuring pyrotechnics, lasers and live actors. Most of the action takes place on a series of offshore platforms, as well as aerial screens of water and mist, with seating right at the beach to take it all in.

Kidzania

Behind Palawan Beach • Daily 10am–6pm • Adults S$35, children S$58 • 1800 653 6888, kidzania.com.sg

Although pricey, the international Kidzania franchise does provides children with terrific role-playing opportunities. Their Singapore set-up is a mini-town in which kids can try “working” in simulations of well-known banks and restaurants, or guide guests around the “Peranakan Museum”, among others. There’s also a “job information centre” – ironically, something that doesn’t exist on the island in real life.

The beaches

The best that can be said about Sentosa’s three beaches, created with vast quantities of imported beige sand, is that they’re decent enough, with blue-green waters, the odd lagoon and facilities for renting canoes, surfboards and aqua bikes. You also get treated to a view of one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes – expect a parade of container ships and other vessels all day.

Siloso Beach, extending 1500m northwest of Beach station, is the busiest of the three. Palawan Beach, in the opposite direction from Beach station, is meant to be the most family-oriented and boasts a children’s play area centred on a mock galleon. It also features a suspension bridge leading out to an islet billed as the “Southernmost Point of Continental Asia” – though a sign concedes that this is so only by virtue of three artificial links, namely the bridge itself, the bridge from HarbourFront to Sentosa, and the Causeway. Beyond Palawan, Tanjong Beach tends to be slightly quieter than the other two as it starts a full kilometre from the station.

ARRIVAL AND DEPARTURE: SINGAPORE

Most visitors fly into Changi International Airport, in the east of the island, or arrive by bus via the 1km Causeway that links Johor Bahru to the island (although some buses use the Second Link bridge into Tuas in the west).

Transport on Sentosa

There are multiple ways to reach the island other than walking, the most popular of which is the Sentosa Express monorail. Note that all the options here include the island entry fee in the fare, and that taxi journeys to and from the island incur a surcharge of several dollars depending on the time of day.

An information point at the end of the Sentosa Boardwalk where you arrive dispenses free maps (also available at monorail stations and from sentosa.com.sg), which are especially handy given that new venues and sights seem to replace others every few months. Alternatively, download the MySentosa app.

Getting to Sentosa

By monorail The Sentosa Express operates every 5min from level 3 of the VivoCity mall (S$4). Note that the ride back to VivoCity is free.

By bus Bus #123 heads to Resorts World from Orchard Rd (passengers do not need to pay the S$1 island admission). At weekends there are one-way night buses #NR1 and #NR6 from Resorts World to Marina Bay, the Colonial District, Clarke Quay and Orchard Rd, with NR#6 continuing to Little India (Fri & Sat 11.30pm–2am; S$4.50).

Transport on the island

All transport on Sentosa itself is free, with the exception of the newly extended cable car.

By bus The island has two buses that run on loop routes until midnight, plus a so-called beach tram running the length of the southern beaches; all services are charted on the free island maps.

By monorail The Sentosa Express calls at Waterfront station on the northern shore (for Resorts World), Imbiah station a little further south, and Beach station on the southern shore, for the three beaches.

By plane

Changi International Airport

Singapore’s airport (6542 4422, changiairport.com), at the eastern tip of the island 16km from downtown, is well laid out and runs like clockwork – the country in microcosm. There are four terminals, connected by free Skytrains. Chances are you’ll not linger long – baggage comes through so swiftly that you can be heading to the city centre within twenty minutes of arrival. Connections with Malaysia and Brunei include:

Destinations Bandar Seri Begawan (1–2 daily; 2hr); Bintulu (3 weekly; 1hr 50min); Ipoh (2 daily; 1hr 30min); Kota Bharu (4 weekly; 1hr 20min); Kota Kinabalu (1–2 daily; 2hr 30min); Kuala Lumpur (KLIA; hourly; 55min); Kuala Lumpur (Subang; at least 6 daily; 1hr); Kuala Terengganu (3 weekly; 1hr 15min); Kuantan (daily; 50min); Kuching (3–4 daily; 1hr 20min); Langkawi (1–2 daily; 1hr 30min); Miri (4 weekly; 2hr); Penang (at least 8 daily; 1hr 20min).

Onward transport Between 6am–11.15pm, the easiest way to get into the city centre from the airport is on an MRT train (change at Tanah Merah; 30min; S$2.50); the station is beneath terminals 2 and 3. Alternatively, bus #36 (same hours, every 10min; around S$2) heads to the Orchard Rd area via Marina Centre and the Colonial District. Transport desks at each terminal can also book you onto the 24hr airport shuttle buses, which serve most downtown hotels and hostels ($9). A taxi downtown costs at least S$20 and takes up to half an hour; there’s an airport surcharge of S$3–5. You can also head straight to Johor Bahru on Transtar buses (daily every 2hrs 8.15am–11.15pm from terminal 2; 1hr 45min; S$10; transtar.travel).

Singapore addresses and maps

Addresses linked to high-rise towers, shopping complexes and other buildings are generally written using two numbers preceded by #, as in #xx-yy. Here xx is the floor (ground level is 01, the next floor up 02, the first basement B01, and so on) while yy is the unit number – thus a restaurant whose address includes #04-08 can be found in unit 8 on the building’s fourth storey. All buildings within municipal housing and industrial estates have a block number displayed prominently on the side, rather than a number relating to their position on the street.

The usual online mapping services cover Singapore pretty well, and they can come in handy as restaurants, shops and even hostels sometimes move their premises because of rent hikes downtown. Two up-to-date, homegrown alternatives are streetdirectory.com (available as an app) and the official onemap.sg; search by entering a building name, road name, six-digit postal code or, for bus information, a five-digit bus stop number.

By train

Malaysian trains run a shuttle service a dozen times a day between Woodlands station near the Causeway checkpoint and Johor Bahru – a 5min journey. If you arrive at Woodlands station, you can catch bus #170 to Bukit Panjang MRT. For those wanting to head to KL or the east coast by train, it’s easier to get a bus to the Causeway and walk through immigration, then continue to JB’s train station on foot.

By bus

In the absence of a long-distance bus terminal, most buses terminate at, and leave from, the Beach Rd area. Heading to Malaysia, note that you don’t have to buy a ticket from Singapore; it’s cheaper to catch a local bus from the Queen St terminal to Johor Bahru’s Larkin bus station, where you can pick up the very same buses for much less money (with additional routes to the east coast, too).

Golden Mile Complex/Golden Mile Tower Most bus companies serving west coast destinations beyond KL and also Hat Yai in Thailand are based at these two neighbouring shopping/office complexes (5001/6001 Beach Rd), including Konsortium (6392 3911, konsortium.com.sg), Grassland Express (6292 1166, grasslandsg.com), Sri Maju (6294 8228, srimaju.com) and Starmart Express (6396 5681, starmartonline.com). Any westbound bus from outside the complex will take you to City Hall MRT station, while Nicoll Highway station is a 10min walk away.

Destinations Alor Star (2 daily; 12hr 30min); Cameron Highlands (1 daily; 10hr); Gopeng (3 daily; 8hr); Hat Yai (Thailand; 3 daily; 14hr); Ipoh (7 daily; 8hr 30min); Kamunting (for Taiping; 2 daily; 9hr 30min); KLIA (7 daily; 5hr); KLIA2 (4 daily; 5hr); Kuala Kangsar (2 daily; 9hr); Kuala Lumpur (at least hourly; 6hr); Lumut (for Pangkor; 1 daily; 9hr 30min); Melaka (at least 8 daily; 3hr 30min); Penang (5 daily; 10hr 30min); Seremban (9 daily; 5hr); Sungai Petani (1 daily; 11hr); TBS (9 daily; 5hr).

The Plaza Transnasional (6294 7034, transnasional.com.my) operates to both coasts from a basement office on the side of The Plaza (7500A Beach Rd) facing away from Beach Rd itself. Arab St and Bugis MRT are just a few minutes away on foot.

Destinations Kota Bharu (via Merang; 1 daily; 13hr); Kuala Lumpur (at least 6 daily; 6hr); Kuala Terengganu (via Dungun, Kemaman and Marang; 2 daily; 10hr); Kuantan (3 daily; 6hr); Mersing (3 daily; 4hr).

Queen St terminal Johor Bahru buses use this terminal near Bugis MRT, including #170 (daily 5.30am–12.30am; every 15min; 1hr–1hr 30min; S$2) and two nonstop services, the Singapore–Johor Express (6am–10pm; every 10min; S$3.30) and the Causeway Link #CW2 (6am–11.45pm; 2–4 hourly; same fare; causewaylink.com.my). Hang on to your ticket at immigration so you can use it to resume your journey (on the same service, though not necessarily on the same vehicle) once you’re through. These buses terminate at JB’s Larkin bus station; if you want to reach the town centre, leave the bus at the Causeway. There’s also a rank for shared taxis to JB (6296 7054; S$12). One long-distance bus company, 707-Inc, uses Queen St for services to Melaka (10 daily; 3hr 30min; 8737 7077, 707-inc.com).

City Plaza This is one of a handful of suburban buildings used by bus companies (810 Geylang Rd; use Paya Lebar MRT), in this case Starmart Express and Golden Coach (goldencoach.com.sg).

Destinations Ipoh (2 daily; 8hr 30min); Kuala Lumpur (4 daily; 6hr); Lumut (for Pangkor; 1 daily; 9hr 30min); Melaka (9 daily; 3hr 30min); Seremban (4 daily; 5hr).

By ferry

Indonesia Ferries serving Batam, Bintan and Karimun in Indonesia’s Riau archipelago (all around S$30 one way in economy class, including taxes) use either the HarbourFront Centre on Telok Blangah Rd (“RFT” in some timetables; HarbourFront MRT) or Tanah Merah ferry terminal in the east of Singapore, linked by bus #35 to Tanah Merah and Bedok MRT stations. For timetables and ferry companies see singaporecruise.com.sg.

Malaysia From the Changi Point terminal near Changi Beach, humble bumboats sail when full to Pengerang, just east of Singapore in the Straits of Johor (daily 7am–4pm; 45min; S$15). There are also ferries to Tanjung Belungkor, just northeast of Singapore (Mon–Fri 2 daily, Sat & Sun 4 daily; S$26 one way, S$39 return; tanjungbelungkor.com). Both services are used mainly by people bound for the unexciting Johor resort of Desaru. In the unlikely event you arrive on one of these routes, catch bus #2 to pick up the MRT at Tanah Merah station.

GETTING AROUND

Just about all parts of Singapore are accessible by bus or the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) metro system. Fares are eminently reasonable and usually rise in tiny steps depending on the distance travelled. Two companies run most of the public transport network: SBS Transit (1800 225 5663, sbstransit.com.sg) and SMRT (1800 336 8900, smrt.com.sg). Their websites can help with journey planning, but more comprehensive advice is available at mytransport.sg or via the MyTransport app.

tickets

ez-link card Although it’s possible to buy tickets for individual train and bus rides, cash is gradually being phased out from the transport system, which makes it all the more sensible to buy a stored-value ez-link card (ezlink.com.sg). Aside from offering convenience, it shaves at least twenty percent off the cash fare, with bigger savings the shorter the trip; what’s more, the card allows changing between buses and trains, reducing the fare again. You can buy the cards at most MRT stations, post offices and 7-11 stores, with stored credit equal to the purchase price (minus S$5 for the card itself). Hold the card over a reader as you exit an MRT barrier or step off a bus for the fare to be calculated and deducted. The cards, which also work as debit cards in some shops and taxis, can be topped up at ticket offices or using ticket machines, and remain valid for at least five years.

Singapore Tourist Pass For short-stay visitors, the three-day Singapore Tourist Pass is ideal (thesingaporetouristpass.com.sg). Sold in visitor centres and a few MRT stations, including the one at the airport, it costs S$10/$16/$20 for 1/2/3 days of unlimited travel (excluding special services such as night buses), plus a S$10 refundable deposit. Once the pass expires, it can be topped up and used like an ez-link card. To reclaim the deposit, be sure to return the card within five days of purchase.

The MRT

Using Singapore’s MRT network (see map) is straightforward, although note that you’re not allowed to eat, drink or smoke on trains. Signs in the stations appear to ban hedgehogs as well, but actually signify “no durians”. Using mobile phones is okay, though – and they even work in the tunnels.

Hours Trains run every five minutes, on average, from 6am until midnight downtown.

Fares From S$1.40 to S$2.50 (S$0.80 to S$2 with an ez-link card).

LRT Three LRT (Light Rail Transit) networks connect suburban estates with the MRT. As a tourist, you’re unlikely to make use of any of them.

Buses

Singapore’s bus network is so comprehensive that the sheer profusion of routes can be confusing. Many bus stops do, however, display lists of destinations served by each route.

Hours Buses start running around 6am and wind down from 11.30pm; the very last regular buses leave downtown around 12.30am. Between midnight and 2am a few Night-Rider (prefixed “NR”) and Nite Owl (suffixed “N”) buses are available; costing around S$4.50, they are one-way services that cross the downtown area and then run as express services to the outlying new towns.

Fares Cash fares range from S$1.30 to S$2.40 (S$0.80 to S$2 with ez-link card). Some buses charge a flat fare while a few don’t take cash at all – check signage at the front of the bus. If you’re paying cash, drop the fare into the metal chute next to the driver; change isn’t given. If you have an ez-link card, you must tap the card on the reader upon entering and at the exit door when you get off, or else the maximum fare will be deducted.

Useful bus routes

A few handy bus routes are listed below. One-way systems downtown mean that services that use Orchard Road and Bras Basah Road in one direction return via Stamford Road, Penang Road, Somerset Road and Orchard Boulevard; buses up Selegie and Serangoon roads return via Jalan Besar and Bencoolen Street; and services along North and South Bridge roads and New Bridge Road return via Eu Tong Sen Street, Hill Street and Victoria Street.

#7 From the Botanic Gardens to Orchard Road, Bras Basah Road and Victoria Street (for Kampong Glam), then on to Geylang Serai.

#36 Loops between Orchard Road and Changi airport via the Marina Centre and the Singapore Flyer.

#65 Orchard Road to Little India and on up Serangoon Road.

#170 From the Queen Street terminal to Bukit Panjang MRT (shadowing the MRT’s Downtown line), then all the way to the Larkin terminal in Johor Bahru. Note that #170A runs the same route but terminates just before the Causeway.

#174 Between the Botanic Gardens and the Baba House in Neil Road, via Orchard Road, the Colonial District, Boat Quay and Chinatown.

Taxis

Thousands of taxis roam the streets of Singapore, so you’ll seldom have trouble hailing a cab – except late at night or when demand soars during a tropical downpour. All are clearly marked “TAXI”. On the whole, drivers are friendly, but their English isn’t always good; if you’re heading off the beaten track, be aware of a landmark they can aim for. Note that in the downtown area, queuing at a taxi rank is supposed to be compulsory Mon–Sat 7.30am–8pm, though some drivers will ignore this rule to pick up passengers on quieter roads.

Fares All drivers use their meters, the fare starting at S$3–4 for the first kilometre, then rising 25¢ every 400m or so (classier limousine taxis cost 30 percent more). There are annoying surcharges: an extra 25 percent is payable Mon–Fri 6–9.30am & 6pm–midnight, Sat & Sun 6pm–midnight, and 50 percent extra nightly between midnight and 6am. Journeys involving Changi airport or the casinos incur a surcharge of several dollars, as do phone bookings. Fares also factor in road usage tolls on journeys along expressways and within the downtown area. You can pay using your card.

Taxi companies Try Comfort/CityCab 6552 1111, cdgtaxi.com.sg; Premier Taxis 6363 6888, premiertaxi.com; SMRT Taxis 6555 8888, smrt.com.sg. Grab and Uber operate here, too.

RIVER TAXIS

Shuttling between Robertson Quay and Marina Bay, river taxis are pricey but still a lot cheaper than Singapore River cruise trips (Mon–Fri 8am–10am & 5–7pm; every 10min; S$5 via ez-link cards only; rivercruise.com.sg).

Driving

Car rental Given the excellent public transport, there’s hardly any reason to rent a car in Singapore, especially considering it’s a pricey business. Major disincentives to driving are in place to combat traffic congestion: a permit just to own a car costs more than many cars themselves. If you were thinking of driving up into Malaysia, rent a car in JB. If you must rent in Singapore itself, contact Avis (avis.com.sg) or Hertz (hertz.com); both have offices at Changi airport.

Tolls Drivers have to pay tolls to enter a restricted zone encompassing Chinatown, Orchard Rd and the Financial District, and to use many of the island’s expressways. This being Singapore, it’s all done in the most hi-tech way using Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) – all cars have a gizmo that reads a stored-value CashCard, from which the toll is deducted as you drive past an ERP gantry.

Parking Generally expensive, though at least many car parks offer the convenience of taking the fee off your CashCard, failing which you have to purchase coupons from a booth, post office or shop.

Driving from Malaysia To drive a Malaysian car into Singapore, you need to buy a stored-value Autopass card and rent a card reader; both are available at the Causeway or Second Link. Thus equipped, you can pay your vehicle entry toll and road tolls in Singapore. For more on this and other matters to do with driving in Singapore, see lta.gov.sg.

Cycling

Despite the clammy heat, tropical downpours and furious traffic, cycling is starting to take off in Singapore, with a handful of bike lanes now in existence and the government publicly committed to making the island more cyclist-friendly in future. Even so, cycling downtown can be tricky unless you have some familiarity with the roads, and bicycles aren’t allowed on expressways.

Bike rental Three outfits, Ofo (ofo.com), Mobike (mobike.com/sg) and local start-up oBike (o.bike), have made quite a splash in Singapore. All feature dockless, internally locked bikes which you locate and unlock via their apps; after use, park the bike sensibly at your destination and relock it. A deposit (at least S$40) is payable to use each service; rental is charged at, for example, 50¢ per 15min with oBike.

Parks and beaches Bikes come into their own in recreational areas and nature parks, which are linked by a park connector network; see nparks.gov.sg. The East Coast Park, on the southeast shore of the island, has a popular cycle track with rental outlets along the way (expect to pay S$6–8 for a mountain bike, and have some form of ID). You’ll also find bike rental at Changi and Siloso beaches (the latter on Sentosa).

Information

Heritage trails Although targeted at a local audience, leaflets describing Singapore neighbourhoods and a few walking trails can be downloaded from ura.gov.sg.

Internet access Internet cafés are fairly thin on the ground. You can still stumble across them in Little India, although the ones here are vanishing too; prices start at S$2/hr. There’s also a free wi-fi network, Wireless@SG/SGx, available in shopping malls and some MRT stations and public buildings. Unfortunately it can be unreliable, and registration requires a password to be sent by text to your phone, which sometimes fails with foreign numbers.

Listings The best of several publications carrying entertainment listings and restaurant reviews is the monthly freebie SGnow (sg.asia-city.com), available at some malls, museums and restaurants. Also of use to visitors is another free magazine, The Finder (thefinder.com.sg), geared towards the large expat community.

Malaysia information Tourism Malaysia, 80 Robinson Rd, Financial District (Mon–Fri 9am–5pm; 6532 6321).

Visitor centres The Singapore Tourism Board (STB; helpline Mon–Fri 9am–6pm 1800 736 2000, visitsingapore.com) bills its tourist offices as visitor centres. Their main downtown location is at 216 Orchard Road (daily 8.30am–9.30pm; Somerset MRT). Much smaller is their counter on the ground floor of the ION Orchard mall (daily 10am–10pm; above Orchard MRT), and their Chinatown office at 2 Banda St, behind the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple (daily 9am–9pm; Chinatown MRT).

Organized tours

Singapore is so easy to navigate that there’s little reason to do an organized tour, which is perhaps why the range of offerings tends to be uninspired. Many seem to feature transport as a key element, whether that be a dedicated tourist bus, a Singapore River boat, a novelty vehicle or the trishaw, which at least hearkens back to the island’s past.

DuckTours 6338 6877, ducktours.com.sg. Tour the Colonial District and Marina Bay on an amphibious vehicle (daily 10am–6pm; S$37).

The Original Singapore Walks 6325 1631, singaporewalks.com. Guided walks of historic downtown areas and Changi (the latter with a wartime focus), generally lasting 2hr 30min; from around S$35 per person.

Singapore Nature Society nss.org.sg. If your stay in Singapore is an extended one, consider taking out annual membership of this conservation group, which conducts guided nature walks, birdwatching trips and so forth.

Trishaw Uncle Booth on Queen St, close to Bugis MRT 6337 7111, trishawuncle.com.sg. This trishaw cooperative charges S$39 for a half-hour ride around the immediate vicinity and Little India, or S$49 for Little India plus Kampong Glam or a one-way ride to Chinatown. Daily 11am–9pm.

Accommodation

If one thing leaves a nasty taste in the mouth in Singapore, it’s the price of accommodation; even a lower-mid-range double room now nudges S$140 a night. On the plus side, most accommodation is of a high standard for the price, and rates have been drifting lower in recent years. Budget travellers have a plethora of centrally located hostels and guesthouses to choose from, often with upmarket decor and fittings; Chinatown and Little India are the best areas for these. Most hotels are blandly modern, but there are plenty of boutique hotels, usually characterful or quirky affairs in refurbished shophouses. One thing to note is that any hotel advertising hourly or “transit” rates tends to be used by locals for illicit liaisons – normally only obviously seedy hotels stoop to this, though the ubiquitous and otherwise well-managed budget chains Hotel 81 and Fragrance have been tainted by this in the past. Most establishments, even hostels, adjust prices year-round in line with demand, and those that do not will offer promotional rates most of the time, except during the Formula One race in the third week of September. The prices here are meant to be typical starting prices, including taxes, if you reserve reasonably early. Besides contacting places directly, you can also book through sites such as agoda.com and hostelworld.com.

The Colonial District

The area immediately north and east of the Singapore River only has a few places to stay, all hotels.

Fort Canning 11 Canning Walk, northern side of Fort Canning Hill 6559 6770, hfcsingapore.com; map. A plush boutique hotel housed in a former British military building; rooms are spacious, immaculately decorated and boast bathtubs that are, curiously, often smack in the middle of the room or out towards the window. There are pools on two levels and lush gardens, too. The one snag: it’s a bit of a trek up flights of steps from Dhoby Ghaut MRT and Orchard Rd. S$350

Novotel Clarke Quay 177A River Valley Rd 6338 3333, novotelclarkequay.com; map. This dull tower block might seem like just another bland business-oriented hotel, but the wood-panelled lobby and tasteful contemporary furnishings give the boutique hotels a run for their money. The usual four-star amenities include pool and gym. S$375

Peninsula Excelsior 5 Coleman St 6337 2200, ytchotels.com.sg; map. Really two hotels fused together – as hinted at by the presence of two swimming pools at either end, one of which abuts the current lobby – and nicely modernized, unlike the 1970s shopping arcades below. S$250

Swissôtel The Stamford 2 Stamford Rd 6338 8585, swissotel.com; map. The upper-floor rooms, restaurants and bars aren’t for those with vertigo, though the views are as splendid as you’d expect from one of the tallest hotels in the world, with over a thousand rooms. Perhaps even more impressive is the fact it has a MRT station (City Hall) in the basement, and a big sports facility with two pools and several tennis courts. S$500

Bras Basah Road to Rochor Road

The grid of streets between Bras Basah Rd and Rochor Rd (and a bit beyond, uphill from Selegie Rd) has been rendered a bit sterile by redevelopment, but remains a good choice if you can afford it; it’s within easy walking distance of the Singapore River, Little India and the eastern end of Orchard Rd.

Hostels and guesthouses

G4 Station 11 Mackenzie Rd 6334 5644, g4station.com; map. An unexciting but well-located hostel, where all residents get a big locker to themselves. Other facilities include a roof terrace and a solitary Wii for gaming. All bathrooms are shared. Dorms S$30, doubles S$75

Hangout@Mount Emily 10A Upper Wilkie Rd 6438 5588, hangouthotels.com; map. Owned by the company behind the historic Cathay cinema at the foot of Mount Emily, the Hangout is an impressive designer guesthouse with a breezy rooftop terrace that’s great for chilling out in the evening, and a convenient self-service laundry. Dorms S$45, doubles S$110

Hotels

Carlton 76 Bras Basah Rd 6338 8333, carltonhotel.sg; map. Boasting a lobby dominated by a spidery glass artwork suspended from the ceiling, this towering four-star hotel has elegant rooms in two wings, plus a pool, spa and gym – and good rates for what’s on offer. S$320

Hotel G 200 Middle Rd 6809 7988, hotelgsingapore.com; map. This new hotel occupies a converted office building, which is perhaps why there’s a touch of post-industrial chic about the rooms, designated “good”, “great” and “greater” in order of size; all are well soundproofed and feature pale wood floors and furniture. The entire ground floor is taken up by two restaurants (breakfast costs extra). S$175

Intercontinental 80 Middle Rd 6338 7600, intercontinental.com; map. Like the adjoining Bugis Junction mall, the Intercontinental incorporates some of the area’s original shophouses, here converted into “heritage rooms” with supposedly Peranakan decor, though this merely amounts to dark wood floors and paintings of tropical fruit. Still, the hotel is luxurious and has all the amenities you could want. S$350

Marriott South Beach 30 Beach Rd 6818 1888, marriott.com; map. Dominating the northern Padang skyline, the box-grater-like towers of the South Beach development incorporate some colonial buildings and this impressive hotel. The lobby – all individually styled chill-out spaces, certainly makes a statement, as do the 600-plus über-chic rooms, the work of French designer Philippe Starck. One of the two pools has glorious views out over the Padang. Nearest stations are Esplanade or City Hall MRT. S$500

Marrison 103 Beach Rd 6333 9928, marrisonhotel.com; map. This simple hotel is surprisingly comfortable, the rooms done out in neutral hues. A good deal, and breakfast can be added for very little extra. S$125

Naumi 41 Seah St 6403 6000, naumihotel.com; map. The slate-grey exterior with what look like vines creeping up doesn’t inspire, but inside is a fine boutique hotel where rooms are kitted out like a slick apartment. The rooftop infinity pool looks out over the Raffles hotel, with the Financial District’s towers beyond. Rooms on one floor are reserved for women only. S$360

Raffles 1 Beach Rd 6337 1886, raffleshotel.com; map. Though the modern extension is a mixed bag, the Raffles remains refreshingly low-rise and still has colonial-era charm in spades, especially evident in the opulent lobby and the courtyards fringed by frangipani trees and palms. Amenities include oodles of restaurants and bars, a rooftop pool and a spa. All rooms are suites, and there’s a round-the-clock butler service. S$800

South East Asia 190 Waterloo St 6338 2394, seahotel.com.sg; map. Behind the yellow and white 1950s facade is a reasonable budget hotel with functional if slightly tired doubles, featuring the usual mod cons. It’s practically next door to the lively Kwan Im temple, to boot. Wi-Fi costs extra. S$100

Little India, Lavender Street and Arab Street

Little India proper and beyond – the zone extending up to Lavender St, reachable via Farrer Park or Lavender stations – has some decent budget accommodation, although hotels can be hit and miss. Handily for those who end up here, there’s an excellent public swimming pool near Farrer Park MRT. The area around Arab St also has some a few places to stay.

Hostels and guesthouses

Backpackers@SG 1st floor, 111J King George’s Ave 6683 2924, bpsg.com.sg; map. Exceptionally plain barring a few snazzy murals, but homelier for it, occupying part of a low-rise residential block. Unlike some, it doesn’t have mega-sized dorms – the largest has eight beds. A reasonable choice for a quiet stay, with additional beds in a sister hostel metres away. Dorms S$25

Bunc@Radius 15 Upper Weld Rd 6262 2862, bunchostel.com; map. A sprawling, glitzy “flashpacker” hostel with a sleek lobby and a warren of dorms beyond, with individual lighting fixtures and sockets for each custom-built bunk bed. There’s a women-only floor as well plus en-suite, wheelchair-accessible private room which anyone can book. Dorms S$25, doubles S$125

Dream Lodge 172 Tyrwhitt Rd 6816 1036, dreamlodge.sg; map. This comfy, superbly run hostel boasts plush capsule beds with privacy drapes and lockers beneath. There’s a cosy lounge with a quirky wall drawing of Singapore landmarks by a young student, and bike rental is on offer. Before you leave, you can opt to have your photo turned into a badge and stuck on their wall adorned with the faces of previous guests. Dorms S$40

Fisher BnB 127 Tyrwhitt Rd 6297 8258, fisherbnb.com; map. This unexpectedly smart guesthouse with a twelve-bed women’s dorm, a sixteen-bed mixed dorm and a family room for four. The bathrooms are just one area where the decor is right up to date – the management is especially proud of the Japanese-built bidets. Dorms S$32, family room S$140

The Inn Crowd 73 Dunlop St 6296 9169, the-inncrowd.com; map. Perennially excellent hostel with some of the cheapest dorms in town plus a range of rooms with, unusually, their own TVs. Shared showers and toilets are kept spotless, and there’s a comfy lounge and cheap beer. They run tours too, including a scooter-powered trip around the old quarters and Gardens by the Bay. Dorms S$20, doubles S$60

Mitraa Inn 531 Serangoon Rd 6396 3317, mitraa.com.sg; map. This bills itself as “the friendliest backpacker hostel”, and friendly it usually is, as well as organized. Unusually, some dorms are en suite, and there’s a range of rooms sleeping two or more. Dorms S$25, doubles S$100

The Pod 289 Beach Rd 6298 8505, thepod.sg; map. Ultra-slick designer place where you check yourself in using an electronic kiosk. Their slogan is “pay for the stay, everything else is free” – and that includes use of their laundry facilities and laptops, plus a cooked breakfast. As the name suggests, all beds are capsule-style, and there are even “suites”, rooms with one or two solitary pods. Prices rise by a fifth at weekends. Dorms S$40

Shophouse 48 Arab St 6298 8721, shophousehostel.com; map. The rooftop lounge/terrace is the standout feature at this slick, bustling hostel which, given the location, also has some predictably quasi-Arabic decor. There’s a roof terrace, laundry service and a women’s floor, too. Dorms S$25, doubles S$80

Vintage Inn 60 Race Course Rd 6396 8751, vintageinn.sg; map. A swanky affair with arrays of capsule-style beds against the wall, each with a privacy curtain. Unusually, there’s also a cooked breakfast. Dorms S$28

Hotels

The Daulat 16 Madras St 6408 5555, thedaulat.com; map. This tiny hotel has an equally tiny rooftop pool, a mere 10m sliver of water. Rooms can be boxy, but some have unusual touches, including upstairs bathrooms in the suites. Rates include breakfast. S$140

Destination 700 Beach Rd 6679 2000, yourdestinationhotel.com; map. A decent mid-range option with bland but nicely soundproofed rooms, in a modern tower. The rooftop pool has good views out towards Marina Bay. S$190

Fragrance Imperial 28 Penhas Rd 6297 8888, fragrancehotel.com; map. Despite the drab yellow exterior, this is a cut above fellow members of the budget chain, with slick if smallish rooms, a café and rooftop swimming pool. Rates include breakfast. S$160

Haising 37 Jalan Besar 6298 1223, haising.com.sg; map. Friendly, secure Chinese-run cheapie offering simple, a/c en-suite rooms with TVs; rather boxy but not bad for the price. S$65

Hilton Garden Inn 3 Belilios Rd 6491 0500, hiltongardeninn3.hilton.com; map. Towering over Little India, this representative of the Hilton chain’s mid-range brand offers understated contemporary decor, a small outdoor pool and some great vistas out over the surrounding shophouses from rooms higher up. Good value. S$225

Mayo Inn 9 Jalan Besar 6295 6631, mayoinn.com; map. There are just two dozen rooms in this cosy budget hotel, some featuring what’s billed as a Japanese-style “bed” – a wooden dais with a mattress on top. Breakfast included. S$110

Moon 23 Dickson Rd 6827 6666, moon.com.sg; map. Aiming to offer a boutique-hotel experience without straining your wallet, the Moon has stylishly kitted-out rooms with snazzy wallpaper and strategically placed drapes – to help take your mind off the fact that many are actually windowless. Rates include breakfast. S$180

The Sultan 101 Jalan Sultan 6723 7101, thesultan.com.sg; map. A pleasant, relatively low-key hotel occupying a series of tastefully refurbished shophouses. Take your pick from, among others, a handful of cosy singles plus so-called attic rooms on the top floor, which are a little quieter than the rest. Excellent value, with breakfast included. S$150

Wanderlust 2 Dickson Rd 6396 3622, wanderlusthotel.com; map. Appealingly wacky, Wanderlust has an “industrial glam” lobby with barber’s chairs, and many rooms are colour-themed, some even with multicoloured lighting you can program. Facilities include a jacuzzi and French restaurant. Rates include breakfast. S$240

Chinatown and Boat Quay

Chinatown runs a close second to Little India and Lavender St in its selection of guesthouses, and also boasts a good many upmarket and boutique hotels. Boat Quay, right on the south bank of the Singapore River, is dominated by restaurants and bars but has a few worthwhile places to stay, one of which is the splendid Fullerton hotel.

Hostels and guesthouses

Adler 259/265 South Bridge Rd 6226 0173, adlerhostel.com; map. What looks like a fancy furniture store from the street is really the lounge of one of the swankiest hostels in town. Its “suite dorms” boast purpose-built capsule beds (including doubles) and the hostel serves an above-average breakfast, including eggs and fruit. Dorms S$55

Beary Best 16 Upper Cross St 6422 4957, bearybesthostel.com; map. A spick-and-span hostel decorated in bright colours and, as the name suggests, bears – ursine stuffed toys litter the place. Beds come with individual reading lights, there’s a self-service laundry, and the management offers bike rental and tours. Dorms S$30, doubles S$90

Bohemian Chic 40 Mosque St 8380 0500; map. Not truly Bohemian but appealingly quirky, with glittery masks like something from a Baroque-era ball lining one wall in the lounge. No dorm has more than eight beds (choose from capsules or cheaper double-deckers), and breakfast includes sandwiches in additional to the self-service basics. Dorms S$32

Box Capsule Hostel 39 Ann Siang Rd 6423 0237, boxcapsulehostel.com.sg; map. Revels in a good location on chichi Ann Siang Hill, with pod-style beds. There’s also a loft space and old-school board games to play. Dorms S$40

Maple Lodge 66A/B Pagoda St 6816 0288, maplelodge.com.sg; map. An unexciting but competently run place with ten- or twelve-bed dorms and lots of pastel colours, just footsteps from the MRT station. Good value for Chinatown. Dorms S$25

Met A Space Pod 51A/B Boat Quay 6635 2694, metaspacepod.com.sg; map. This hostel has high-tech capsule beds which can give you the impression of climbing into a washing machine drum, if not your own personal cylinder on a spaceship. Each bed has a built-in control panel, TV and safe. The kitchen, bathrooms and breakfasts are much more down to earth. Dorms S$25

Wink 8A Mosque St 6222 2940, winkhostel.com; map. One of the best designer hostels in town, with hi tech capsule beds (including some doubles), each inside flower-themed rooms with colour-coded lighting to match. Facilities include an upstairs kitchen and lounge, and free use of a tablet computer for every guest. Dorms S$50, doubles S$95

Hotels

Amoy 76 Telok Ayer St 6580 2888, stayfareast.com; map. Entered via the Fuk Tai Chi Museum, this hotel manages to squeeze the best out of every nook and cranny of its shophouse conversion. Rooms are on the small side but feature the odd unusual touch such as slat-floored bathrooms through which water drains away. S$275

Chinatown 12–16 Teck Lim Rd 6225 5166, chinatownhotel.com; map. Not bad for the price and location, the Chinatown has serviceable rooms done out in the usual neutral tones. The bathrooms can be a bit poky, but at least a basic self-service breakfast is included. S$150

Clover 5 Hongkong St 6653 8888, hotelclover.com; map. Functional, contemporary rooms in a six-storey building crowned by a small rooftop pool. Their sister hotel, round the corner, offers slightly bigger rooms with funky murals and access to the same pool, for about ten percent extra. S$175

The Fullerton 1 Fullerton Square 6733 8388, fullertonhotels.com; map. Nearly as impressive as the Raffles, with a stunning Art Deco atrium; rooms and bathrooms are spacious and feature contemporary styling. Amenities include a gym, spa and pool. S$500

Hotel 1929 50 Keong Saik Rd 6347 1929, hotel1929.com; map. This shophouse hotel looks genuinely 1929 on the outside, but the interior has been renovated to look like a twenty-first-century version of the early 1960s, all very retro chic. S$180

The Inn at Temple Street 36 Temple St 6221 5333, theinn.com.sg; map. This place is packed with old-fangled furniture for a semblance of a period feel, but the rooms are boxy and there’s no breakfast. Still, you can’t argue with their prices. S$125

Parkroyal On Pickering 3 Upper Pickering St 6809 8888, parkroyalhotels.com; map. Looming over Hong Lim Park, this is one of Singapore’s most architecturally striking hotels since Marina Bay Sands and likewise has three towers, linked by curvy-sided rice-terrace-like structures overflowing with vegetation. The use of wood and glass throughout emphasizes the natural theme, in part by allowing plenty of sunlight in. Another garden crops up at the open-sided central tier that serves as a “wellness floor”, home to the infinity pool, spa and gym. S$450

Tanjong Pagar and The Financial District

There are only a few hotels amid the office towers of Tanjong Pagar and the Financial District. Neither area is all that interesting to stay in, but proximity to Chinatown and the Colonial District make them worth considering.

Klapstar 15 Hoe Chiang Rd 6533 9000, klapstar.com; map. There are just seventeen rooms in this boutique hotel, each with different decor; the suites boast a jacuzzi for good measure. S$250

Sofitel So 35 Robinson Rd 6701 6800, sofitel.com; map. Almost lost amid the staid bank buildings, this is a super-cool, Karl Lagerfeld-influenced conversion of two narrow office blocks. The “heritage wing” has decor like a French palace; across the atrium from it is the quirky, eclectic “hip wing”, where you might find Russian dolls on the tables or wall-mounted plastic hands for hanging clothes. S$480

Marina Bay

Marina Bay accommodation is synonymous with modern four- and five-star affairs, all located at the rather bland Marina Centre district next to Beach Rd, with the obvious exception of Marina Bay Sands.

Marina Bay Sands 10 Bayfront Ave 6688 8868, marinabaysands.com; map. Not just one of the island’s most famous buildings but also the largest hotel in Singapore, with an astonishing 2500 rooms. Frankly they’re no better than those in most of its five-star competitors unless you shell out for, say, one of the Straits suites, with two en-suite bedrooms, a baby grand piano and butler service – costing thousands a night. Otherwise, stay here for the architecture and the infinity pool. S$575

Ritz-Carlton Millenia 7 Raffles Ave 6337 8888, ritzcarlton.com; map. Arguably king of the pricey hotels in Marina Centre, with magnificent views across to the towers of the Financial District – even from the bathrooms, where butlers will fill the bath for you. S$600

Orchard Road

You generally pay a premium to stay in the Orchard Rd shopping area, though it’s hardly the most interesting part of downtown, and now that many stores have branches across the city, only the sheer modernity of the district lends it any edge.

Goodwood Park 22 Scotts Rd 6737 7411, goodwoodparkhotel.com; map. Built on a leafy hillock and designed by the architect responsible for the Raffles, this is a genuine landmark in a cityscape characterized by transience. It still exudes the refinements of a bygone era and boasts a variety of rooms and suites, plus several highly rated restaurants and two pools. S$375

Lloyd’s Inn 2 Lloyd Rd 6737 7309, lloydsinn.com; map. Less than a 10min walk from Orchard Rd, this low-rise, recently modernized establishment has rooms where the beds are raised on platforms with storage space beneath. Some bathrooms are open to the outside air (with a privacy curtain, of course). There’s a garden, too, largely taken up by a water feature intended for foot-dipping. Breakfast included. S$240

Mandarin Orchard 333 Orchard Rd 6737 4411, meritushotels.com; map. Female staff at this old favourite wear kitsch quasi-oriental uniforms, but don’t let that put you off; this towering hotel with more than 1000 rooms is still at the top of its game, luxurious to a fault, and has its own high-end mini-mall, too. S$375

The Quincy 22 Mount Elizabeth 6738 5888, quincy.com.sg; map. One of Singapore’s more endearing boutique hotels, melding contemporary aesthetics with comfort. Features include glass-walled bathrooms in some rooms, and a pool near the top of the building. Note that it’s a 10min, slightly uphill walk off Orchard Rd. Rate includes breakfast. S$350

Shangri-La 22 Orange Grove Rd 6737 3644, shangri-la.com; map. A 10min walk west of Orchard Rd, the oldest member of what’s now a global hotel chain still epitomizes elegance, with 750 rooms set in oodles of landscaped greenery. Facilities include tennis courts, gym, pool and spa. S$525

Supreme 15 Kramat Rd 6737 8333, supremeh.com.sg; map. This 1970s concrete box has basic, predictably dated rooms, though they’re not too cramped; rates are a steal and include breakfast. S$120

YMCA 1 Orchard Rd 6336 6000, ymcaih.com.sg; map. This place is predictably staid and the rooms are plain, but nowhere downtown do you get amenities like a pool and gym at the prices charged here (except, as it happens, at the YWCA nearby). S$160

Yotel 366 Orchard Rd 6336 6000, yotel.com; map. This upstart international hotel chain wants to emulate the experience of flying first class, but in reality it’s more like a smart home: beds, TV and lighting in your room can be controlled by your phone or tablet, and you can even check yourself in with their app. Everything’s ultramodern in the blandest way, and the cheapest rooms are windowless, but a pool and gym are available. S$250

Geylang and katong

With the range of accommodation available downtown, there are few compelling reasons to stay in the suburbs except to save a little money. Katong, with its Peranakan heritage and good restaurants, is as good a choice as any, though note that some of neighbouring Geylang’s seediness can spill over into Joo Chiat Rd after dark.

Betel Box 200 Joo Chiat Rd 6247 7340, betelbox.com; map. Styling itself Singapore’s socially committed hostel, Betel Box tries to highlight the island’s heritage by organizing tours of interesting neighbourhoods. A 15min walk from Paya Lebar MRT, or bus #33 from Kallang, Kembangan or Dakota MRT. Dorms S$20, doubles S$80

Santa Grand East Coast 171 East Coast Rd 6344 6866, santagrand.sg; map. One of the nicer offerings from this mid-priced chain, partly housed in a conservation building. Rooms are more than adequate, and the secluded rooftop pool is a bonus. Bus #14 from Dhoby Ghaut/Mountbatten/Bedok MRT. S$160

Sentosa

Staying on Sentosa isn’t such a bad idea, especially if you have young children. Note that prices can rise by twenty percent over weekends and holidays.

Hotel Michael Resorts World 6577 8888, rwsentosa.com. The main reason to stay at Resorts World is to tap into packages that throw in discounted or free admission to Universal Studios and so forth. Hotel Michael is more interesting than the rest, with fittings, wall paintings and other decorative touches by the American architect and designer Michael Graves. S$350

Le Meridien Sentosa 23 Beach View, near Imbiah station 6818 3388, lemeridiensingaporesentosa.com. A splendid hotel housed partly in former British barracks dating from 1940. All rooms have elegant contemporary fittings, but the most impressive are the pricey onsen suites with their own large outdoor Japanese hot tub. S$250

Rasa Sentosa Resort Western end of Siloso Beach 6275 0100, shangri-la.com. One of the best pre-casino-era hotels; family-friendly, it boasts a large freeform pool with water slides, a kids’ club with purpose-built play areas and activities such as treasure hunts and beach walks, plus a spa. S$400

Siloso Beach Resort 51 Imbiah Walk 6722 3333, silosobeachresort.com. The central swimming pool is a stunner, its curvy fringes planted with lush vegetation and featuring a waterfall and slides; it far outshines the slightly tired rooms. Still, the resort is tranquil enough (the music from the nearby beach bars generally stops around 10pm) and rates include breakfast. S$240

Eating

Along with shopping, eating ranks as Singapore’s national pastime. Walk along any street downtown and just about every other building seems to be overflowing with food outlets, from restaurants to corner kiosks serving snacks. It’s not just local food on offer, of course: the island’s restaurants truly run the gamut of Asian and international cuisine. As in Malaysia, food is both a passion and a unifier across ethnic divides. Certain foods are largely or uniquely Singaporean: chilli crab, a sweet-spicy dish pioneered at long-gone rural seaside restaurants and now served all over the island; and bak chor mee, ribbon noodles with minced pork and chilli vinegar – to name but two. Some Chinese restaurants and kopitiams are popular for zichar food – essentially informal, done-to-order cooking that isn’t hung up on classical traditions or fancy presentation.

Cookery classes

There are two venues with half-day courses in the rudiments of Southeast Asian and other cooking. Food Playground (24A Sago St, Chinatown; 9452 3669; foodplayground.sg) is an unusual set-up where senior citizens, among others, get a chance to teach local recipes, including ones for many hawker favourites (S$120). For a broader culinary palette, try the courses at Coriander Leaf, run by the restaurant’s owner Samia Ahad; she covers Singaporean, Indochinese and Middle Eastern cookery (S$160).

Essentials

Booking It’s worth booking a table at weekends, when many restaurants are packed out – either contact the venue directly, or try chope.co or the Chope app.

Costs When it comes to costs, by far the cheapest and most fun places to eat are hawker centres/food courts, housed either within shopping malls or in their own open-air premises, where you can eat well for S$10/person. Old-fangled kopitiams (the same as kedai kopis in Malaysia) are also inexpensive, though increasingly rare downtown. Prices at mid-range restaurants start at around S$20/person, with non-Asian food always noticeably more expensive, although many places do have good-value weekday set lunch specials. As with hotel bills, there’s also the matter of the ten percent service charge and 7 percent tax, levied by all the pricier restaurants and cafés (price indications here include these surcharges).

The Colonial District

Although you can eat cheaply in the Colonial District inside malls, the more interesting restaurants tend to be pricey places housed within conservation buildings.

Brussels Sprouts #01–12 The Pier at Robertson Quay, 80 Mohamed Sultan Rd 6887 4344, brusselssprouts.com.sg; map. This riverside restaurant specializes in – you guessed it – Belgian-inspired mussels and clams. There’s a bewildering range of seasonings, from a strongly alcoholic white wine sauce to Thai tom yam (S$50 with fries). You can also choose from a plethora of fruity Belgian beers, including Leffe on draught. Mon–Thurs 3pm–midnight, Fri 2pm–2am, Sat 11am–2am, Sun 11am–midnight.

Cedele #03–28, Raffles City, above City Hall MRT 6337 8017, cedelegroup.com; map. A café-bakery combo, Cedele serves up some of the very best sandwiches in Singapore (S$8) – think, say, honey dijon chicken on rosemary focaccia – and sells a vast variety of specialist breads. Some branches, like this one, also have a restaurant with inventive light meals and all-day breakfasts (all around S$20). Daily 11am–9.30pm.

Coriander Leaf #02-01 CHIJMES, 30 Victoria St 6837 0142, corianderleaf.com; map. Pan-Asian and Mediterranean food in elegant upstairs premises, encompassing everything from Lebanese meze to Vietnamese spring rolls, with a menu of mix-and-match options. They serve an astonishing range of Asian liqueurs and whiskies, too. At least S$40/person without drinks. Mon–Fri noon–2pm & 6.30–10.30pm, Sat 6.30–10.30pm.

Flutes National Museum, 93 Stamford Rd 6338 8770, flutes.com.sg; map. An upmarket choice for modern European and fusion cuisine. It’s pricey unless you go for the set lunch (two courses for around S$45) or, even better, the Sunday lunch of roast beef with the usual trimmings, plus dessert (also S$45). Mon–Fri 11.30am–2pm & 6.30–10pm, Sat 10.30am–2pm & 6.30–10pm, Sun 10.30am–4pm.

Shiraz Block A, Clarke Quay #01–06 6334 2282, shirazfnb.com; map. The best Persian restaurant in town, not that there’s much competition, but the many Iranians among the clientele can’t be wrong. Portions of tender kebabs and stews, served with mounds of fluffy, aromatic saffron rice, are massive. Not cheap – main courses start at S$35 – but still better value than most places in overpriced Clarke Quay. Belly-dancing some evenings, too, and they do serve alcohol. Mon–Thurs 6.30–11pm, Fri & Sat noon–3pm & 6.30pm–2.30am, Sun 6.30pm–2am.

Bras Basah Road to Rochor Road

The area sandwiched between the Colonial District and Little India features plenty of well-established restaurants, including a good cluster close to Raffles Hotel.

Ah Chew Desserts #01–11, 1 Liang Seah St 6339 8198; map. Taking up two shophouses, Ah Chew confronts you with strange local sweets containing beans or other unexpected ingredients. The cashew-nut paste is not bad if you like the sound of a broth made of nut butter; also available are the likes of pulot hitam, made with black sticky rice. Cautiously sample a few items by ordering the small servings; most bowls cost S$5 or so. Hours can vary to what’s shown. Daily 1.30–11.30pm.

Artichoke 161 Middle Rd 6336 6949; map. Inspired Middle Eastern-tinged fusion food conceived by the idiosyncratic owner Bjorn Shen. For weekend brunch, there are mains such as the superbly rich lamb shakshouka, lamb shoulder alongside spicy baked eggs; in the evenings, choose from meze and sharing platters, including quirky offerings such as beetroot tzatziki and pork with a coffee and date sauce. The only desserts are their wonderful “neh neh pop” – homemade stick ice creams in flavours such as chocolate baklava. Mains from around S$30; weekend reservations advised. Tues–Fri 6.30–10.30pm, Sat 11.30am–3.30pm & 6.30–10.30pm, Sun 11.30am–3.30pm.

Baker & Cook Intercontinental Hotel, North Bridge Rd 6825 1502, bakerandcook.biz; map. Up-and-coming café chain, Kiwi-run and featuring New Zealand coffee, great croissants and brownies, plus quiches, open sandwiches and salads. Daily 8am–7pm.

Chin Chin 19 Purvis St 6337 4640; map. This likeably old-fangled Chinese shophouse diner with a cheap and cheerful menu of Hainanese standards like breaded pork chops and more generic faves, including chicken sautéed with cashew nuts and spicy mapo beancurd. Around S$20/person, minus drinks. Daily 7am–9pm.

The Daily Scoop School of the Arts, opposite the start of Bras Basah Rd 6509 4875; map. One of a number of quality ice-cream makers boasting some distinctly Asian flavours such as cendol (the coconut milk dessert) or maoshanwang (a variety of durian) alongside creations such as lychee Martini. Around S$4 will get you a takeaway cone; if you eat in, you can pair your scoop with waffles, brownies and the like. Mon–Thurs & Sun 11am–10pm, Fri & Sat 11am–10.30pm.

Fatty’s Wing Seong #01–31 Burlington Square, 175 Bencoolen St 6338 1087; map. Run by an avuncular chubby cook in bygone decades, Fatty’s was an institution on the now-vanished foodie paradise that was Albert St. Today it’s a touristy restaurant that maintains the original’s no-frills zichar approach, and also does standards such as chicken rice. Around S$20/person without drinks. Daily noon–2.30pm & 5.15–10.15pm.

Herbivore #01–13 Fortune Centre, 190 Middle Rd 6333 1612, herbivore.sg; map. There’s a cluster of vegetarian restaurants near Waterloo St’s Kwan Im Temple, particularly at the Fortune Centre building, where the star is this excellent place serving tasty tempura, “chicken” teriyaki and so forth. Good-value sets (from S$25) with noodles or rice plus accompaniments like soya sashimi, pickle and salad, plus dessert. Daily 11.30am–10pm.

Tiffin Room Raffles Hotel, 1 Beach Rd 6412 1190; map. High tea at this Anglo-Indian-themed restaurant is a genuinely scrumptious buffet of English scones, pastries, cakes and sandwiches, plus pies with a chicken curry filling and even dim sum – a real treat at S$70. High tea daily 3–5.30pm. Daily 6.30–10.30am, noon–2pm & 7–10pm.

Yhingthai Palace #01–04, 36 Purvis St 6337 1161, yhingthai.com.sg; map. A smart Chinese-influenced Thai restaurant, where you can’t go wrong with the deep-fried pomfret with mango sauce or deboned chicken wings stuffed with asparagus and mushroom. Around S$40/person, excluding drinks. Daily 11.30am–2pm & 6–10pm.

Little India and lavender street

Little India is paradise if you’re after maximum flavour for minimum outlay; the first part of Serangoon Rd and its side streets, as well as Race Course Rd, are packed with inexpensive curry houses specializing in South Indian food, often dished out on banana leaves and with plenty of vegetarian options; some places offer North Indian and Nepali dishes too. The only drawback to eating here is the dearth of worthwhile places that aren’t Indian.

Banana Leaf Apolo 54 Race Course Rd 6293 8682; map. Banana-leaf-type restaurant with a wide selection of Indian dishes, including fish-head curry (from S$25 depending on size) plus chicken, mutton and prawn curries (S$15). The lunchtime “South Indian vegetarian meal” is a steal, a huge thali of rice, poppadoms, two main curries and several side ones, plus a dessert, for S$10. There’s another branch in the Little India Arcade nearby. Daily 10am–10pm.

Chye Seng Huat Hardware 150 Tyrwhitt Rd 6396 0609, cshhcoffee.com; map. Part of the slow gentrification that’s converting the area’s hardware shops into restaurants and hostels, CSHH is a hip café-bar with all-day breakfasts and varied mains that include linguine with bacon or Japanese curry rice (around S$20). Marvellous light bites too, like soon kueh (savoury bamboo shoot dumplings) and cempedak (a jackfruit relative) crumble, with coffee blended and ground on the premises. In the evening the focus shifts to their craft beer stall in the courtyard. Tues–Thurs & Sun 9am–10pm, Fri & Sat 9am–midnight.

Gokul 19 Upper Dickson Rd 6396 7769; map. Although they do serve standard Indian vegetarian dishes, Gokul also does great meatless versions of local street food classics such as mee rebus, the Malay noodle dish with a spicy/tangy gravy. Around S$15/person. Daily 10.30am–9.30pm.

Hillman 135 Kitchener Rd 6221 5073, hillmanrestaurant.com; map. This little Chinese restaurant is oddly popular with Japanese businessmen, though don’t let that put you off. They come, as you should, for the tip-top zichar food. The claypot dishes are a particular speciality, ranging from noodles to, for the adventurous, sea cucumber – not a vegetable but a marine relative of starfish. Reckon on S$35/person excluding drinks. Daily 11.30am–2.30pm & 5.30–10.30pm.

Komala Villas 76–78 Serangoon Rd 6293 6980, komalavilas.com.sg; map. In business since 1947, this rather cramped vegetarian establishment has more than a dozen variations of dosai – what they’re best at, although they also have more substantial rice meals – which are just a few dollars each, with fresh coconut water to wash it down. There’s another branch at 12–14 Buffalo Rd (6293 3664). Daily 7am–10.30pm.

Madras Woodlands Ganga 1 Cuff Rd 6297 1594; map. This simple vegetarian restaurant serves up great-value Indian buffets (Mon–Fri lunchtime S$10, evenings and weekends S$12), featuring several curries, rice, nan and a dessert, with the option of ordering à la carte as well. Daily 11am–3pm & 6.30–10.30pm.

Saravanaa Bhavan 84 Syed Alwi Rd 6297 7755, saravanabhavan.com; map. A South Indian vegetarian franchise, hailing from Chennai but with branches as far afield as New York. It has all the staples, from vada (dhal-flour doughnuts) to dosai, plus non-Tamil dishes like bisabelabeth, a rice, vegetable and lentil concoction from Karnataka. Also try the Chinese-influenced “Manchurian” dishes – basically sweet-and-sour. Reckon on S$15/person, minus drinks. Daily 9am–midnight.

Tekka Food Centre Alongside Tekka market at start of Serangoon Rd; map. One of the best old-school hawkers’ centres on the island, always steamy, hot and busy. The Indian and Malay stalls are especially good; look out for exceptional Indian rojak – assorted fritters with sweet dips. There’s a decent selection of Chinese stalls too, but they pale by comparison. Daily 7am–late.

Tiramisu Hero 121 Tyrwhitt Rd 6292 5271; map. Popular indie café with black-and-white cartoon artwork and three sizes of tiramisu in a multitude of flavours (like matcha green tea, Bailey’s and durian). Also loads of waffles, breakfasts and mains such as crayfish pasta (around S$20). Mon–Thurs & Sun 11am–10pm, Fri & Sat 11am–midnight.

Arab Street/Kampong Glam

It seems natural that Arab St should be awash with Middle Eastern and North African restaurants with meze, kebabs and couscous, but many of these places are recent and rather slapdash interlopers; the mainstay of the area’s dining has long been Malay and Indonesian food. Note that the more traditional venues don’t serve alcohol.

Blu Jaz Café 11 Bali Lane 9199 0610, blujazcafe.net; map. Easily spotted thanks to its gaudy decor, this venue led the gentrification of the area, and now runs two other similarly garish venues close by. The menu combines Turkish, East Asian and European food – anything from chicken kebab to fish and chips – at affordable prices; most mains cost S$10–15. Live jazz nights, too. Mon–Thurs noon–1am, Fri noon–2am, Sat 4pm–2am.

Bumbu 44 Kandahar St 6392 8628, bumbu.com.sg; map. An entire shophouse festooned with antique Peranakan tiles and carved wooden screens hosts this restaurant serving a terrific mix of Thai and Indonesian cuisine, all fragrantly spiced. Standouts include the inky stir-fried squid, chilli basil chicken and bean sprouts with salted egg yolk, plus traditional desserts such as sago with palm molasses. Eminently affordable at around S$25/person, without drinks. Tues–Sun 11am–3pm & 6–10pm.

Hajjah Maimunah 11 & 15 Jalan Pisang 6297 4294, hjmaimunah.com; map. A tiny branch of the Geylang restaurant that’s one of very few places in Singapore for authentic, inexpensive Malay meals; snacks and Malay dessert also available. Closed during Ramadan. Mon–Sat 7am–8pm.

Islamic Restaurant 745 North Bridge Rd 6298 7563; map. The modernized premises don’t hint at this restaurant’s heritage – make sure you check out the photos of functions they catered for in the 1920s. Biriyanis are their speciality (S$8) though they also do a huge range of North Indian chicken, mutton, prawn, squid and veg curries, with good-value set meals at around S$10. Mon–Thurs, Sat & Sun 10am–10pm, Fri 10am–1pm & 2pm–10pm.

Kampong Glam Café 17 Bussorah St; map. Fantastic roadside kopitiam serving inexpensive Malay rice and noodle dishes, cooked to order, plus curries. Come not just for the food but for a good chinwag with friends over teh tarik late into the evening. Closed every other Monday. Daily 8am–3am.

Rumah Makan Minang 18 Kandahar St, 9384 4484, minang.sg; map. A street-corner place serving superb nasi padang, including the mildly spiced chicken balado and more unusual curries made with tempeh (fermented soybean cakes) or offal. For dessert you might get freshly made sweet pancakes stuffed with peanuts and corn – much better than they sound. Just S$10/head for a good feed. Mon–Fri 8.30am–8pm, Sat & Sun 8.30am–5pm.

Zam Zam 697 & 699 North Bridge Rd 6298 7011; map. Staff at this venerable Indian Muslim kopitiam have the annoying habit of touting for custom even though the place draws crowds, especially on Fridays, with its murtabak and biriyani offerings (there’s even a venison version of the latter). Avoid the house speciality drink, katira – it’s like one of the local sickly ice desserts, only melted. Daily 8.30am–10pm.

Chinatown

Singapore’s Chinatown is, of course, no Chinese ghetto and its eating places are thus pretty diverse, although the central Sago, Smith, Terengganu and Pagoda streets tend to be dominated by touristy Chinese restaurants – seldom the best in their class.

Annalakshmi #01–04 Central Square, 20 Havelock Rd 6339 9993, annalakshmi.com.sg; map. Come here for excellent Indian vegetarian buffets served up by volunteers, with no price specified; you pay what you feel the meal was worth. Profits go to an association promoting South Indian culture. Note that they take a dim view of people helping themselves to more than they can finish. Also a more central branch at 104 Amoy St (Mon–Sat 11am–3pm; 6223 0809). Mon 11am–3pm, Tues–Sun 11am–3pm & 6.15–9.30pm.

Chinatown Complex Behind the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple; map. The hawkers upstairs are much preferable to anything on the ersatz “food street” of Smith St, and at the time of writing one of their number had shot to fame as one of the island’s two Michelin-starred stalls: Liao Fan Hong Kong Soya Sauce Chicken Rice (at #02-126; irregular hours but at least late morning until 3pm). If you don’t fancy lining up for half an hour to pay S$2 for a plate, then eat at their pricier, fast-food-style outlet at 78 Smith St (Thurs–Tues until 9pm). Daily 7am–late.

Chongwen Ge Café 168 Telok Ayer St 9129 1625; map. Next to Thian Hock Keng, little place has a short, satisfying menu of spicy Peranakan classics like mee siam (vermicelli in a tamarind/coconut milk sauce) and otah (fish dumplings). You can eat indoors or outside at the base of the pagoda. Nothing costs more than S$12. Daily 10am–6pm.

Indochine Upstairs at 47 Club St 6323 0503, indochine-group.com; map. Classy Vietnamese, Lao and Cambodian cuisine in chic surroundings sums up this chain, and their Club St venue is no exception. The Vietnamese chao tom (minced prawn wrapped round sugar cane) and deep-fried spring rolls are mouthwatering starters, while the Lao larb kai (chicken in lime juice with salad) is one of many excellent main dishes. Around S$40/person, excluding drinks. Mon–Fri noon–3pm & 6–10.30pm, Sat 6–10.30pm.

Kok Sen 30 & 32 Keong Saik Rd 6223 2005; map. Open to the street at the front and back, with the odd pigeon loitering between basic tables, this zichar place serves food as exemplary as the decor is plain: try their har cheong kai (fried chicken seasoned in fermented prawn paste), black bean beef hor fun noodles, or even the very spicy kung pao frog. Note that the English name on their sign is hard to spot. Daily noon– 2.30pm & 5–11.30pm.

Lee Tong Kee 278 South Bridge Rd 6226 0417, ipohhorfun.com; map. For years the speciality of this retro-styled restaurant, with old-fashioned fans and marble tables, has been Ipoh-style hor fun (around S$7), supposedly smoother than equivalent tagliatelli-type rice noodles. Try the signature lime juice too, usually served with a pinch of salt to balance the sugar. Mon 11am–4pm, Wed & Thurs 11am–6pm, Fri–Sun 11am–8pm.

Lime House 2 Jiak Chuan Rd 6222 3130, limehouse.asia; map. An impressively renovated shophouse where the culinary focus is on the opposite corner of the earth – the Caribbean. The menu includes standards like curried goat, but more interesting are fusiony dishes like the rib-eye steak with a Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee marinade (S$45). Plenty of rum-based cocktails, too, with a bar in the back garden. Tues–Fri 5pm–midnight, Sat 3pm–midnight, Sun 11am–4pm.

Maxwell Food Centre Corner of South Bridge & Maxwell rds; map. One of Singapore’s first hawker centres and home to a clutch of popular Chinese stalls, including the well-known Tian Tian for Hainanese chicken rice, plus others that are good for satay or rojak. Daily roughly 7am–midnight.

My Awesome Café 202 Telok Ayer St 8428 0102, myawesomecafe.com; map. This verging-on-hipster café, in a former Chinese shophouse clinic, constantly draws a crowd with its jumbo salads, sandwiches and wraps (around S$20); sharing platters and a few mains also available. Daily 9.30am–midnight.

Spring Court 52–56 Upper Cross St 6449 5030, springcourt.com.sg; map. With a pre-war pedigree, Spring Court is now a mammoth occupying multiple floors of adjacent shophouses. Its popularity hasn’t blunted the quality of the cooking; must-tries include the excellent if expensive popiah (steamed spring rolls, hand-wrapped by staff at a counter outside; S$10) and steamed chicken with Chinese ham and greens. Plenty of seafood options plus dim sum, too. At least S$30/person without drinks. Daily 11am–3pm & 6–10.30pm.

Tak Po 42 Smith St 6225 0302; map. Compact, competent and inexpensive Cantonese restaurant, refreshingly untouristy considering the location, with a/c inside and some tables out on the street. All the usual dim sum favourites, including siu mai dumplings, yam cake and excellent pork ribs with black beans, plus a wide range of congees (savoury rice porridges). For afters, try the baked egg tarts, which are spot on, neither too flaky nor oversweet. Around S$20/person without drinks. Daily 7am–10.30pm.

Urban Bites 161 Telok Ayer St 6327 9460, urbanbites.com.sg; map. It’s nothing much to look at, but serves excellent Lebanese cuisine, from a tender kafta khashkhash (minced lamb kebab) to home-cooking favourites like mujadara (rice with lentils and fried onions). You can order mezze-style or individual mains; reckon on S$30/person, minus drinks. Mon–Sat 10.30am–10pm.

Yixin 43 Temple St; map. Workaday vegetarian place turning out dishes such as mock Peking duck (S$8), plus rice and noodle standards like lor mee (noodles in a tangy, gloopy sauce). Daily 7.30am–9.30pm.

Zhonghua Bao Ding 241 South Bridge Rd, opposite the Sri Mariamman Temple 6323 2696; map. Barely signed in English, the “Explosion Pot Barbecue” (as it styles itself) specializes, unusually for a Chinese restaurant, in grills. Most of the clientele are mainland Chinese, here for spicy mutton and beef kebabs, pork crackling, duck necks and other greasy but tasty delights. Around S$20/person, minus drinks. Daily noon–10pm.

Boat Quay to Riverside Point

The south bank of the Singapore River is packed with busy restaurants and bars, at their most atmospheric in the restored shophouses of boisterous Boat Quay, though even the modern complexes can be a more enticing prospect than overpriced Clarke Quay on the north bank. All places reviewed here are right by the river or no more than a couple of streets back from it.

Brewerkz #01–05/06 Riverside Point, 30 Merchant Rd 6438 7438, brewerkz.com; map. Popular for its highly rated beers, brewed on site, and American food, including excellent burgers and sandwiches, plus barbecued ribs, pizzas, nachos and the like. It’s on the pricey side though, with burgers starting at S$25, but there is a three-course lunch deal for S$20. Mon–Thurs & Sun noon–midnight, Fri & Sat noon–1am.

Rendezvous #02–72 The Central, 6 Eu Tong Sen St 6339 7508, rendezvous-hlk.com.sg; map. For decades Rendezvous has been dishing out its revered nasi padang. Its current location in a mediocre mall doesn’t suit at all, but thankfully the curries have stayed the course, in particular the superb chicken korma – a mild curried stew of just the right degree of richness, derived from coconut milk rather than cream or yoghurt. Around S$20/person. Daily 11am–9pm.

Ya Kun Kaya Toast #01–31 The Central, 6 Eu Tong Sen St; map. Now a ubiquitous chain, Ya Kun started out in the pre-war years as a Chinatown stall offering classic kopitiam breakfast fare – kaya toast (the same as roti kahwin in Malaysia) plus optional soft-boiled eggs eaten with white pepper and soy sauce. Of course there’s strong local coffee too, normally had with condensed or evaporated milk. Daily 7am–10pm.

Street ice cream

A couple of generations ago, ice cream in Singapore often meant stuff sold by hawkers from pushcarts, in exotic flavours like sweetcorn, red (aduki) bean and yam. This was so-called potong (“cut” in Malay) ice cream because it came in brick shapes and the seller would use a cleaver to slice it into slabs, to be served either between wafers or even rolled up in white bread – giving a new dimension to the term “ice cream sandwich”.

The general elimination of street stalls put paid to that trade, but in recent years the ice-cream vendors have made a comeback. They’re often to be seen at Cavenagh Bridge, on Orchard Road, outside Bugis MRT and at other downtown locations. The bread option complements the ice cream surprisingly well, serving as a sort of neutral sponge cake. As for the weird flavours, they’re all more than palatable; you can also find red-bean ice cream on a stick in supermarkets and convenience stores, sold under the name “Potong”.

Tanjong Pagar and the Financial District

You’re unlikely to head to these areas for the food alone, but they do boast some excellent restaurants.

Blue Ginger 97 Tanjong Pagar Rd 6222 3928, theblueginger.com; map. In a smartly renovated shophouse, this trendy Nyonya restaurant has become a firm favourite thanks to such dishes as ikan masal asam gulai (mackerel in a tamarind and lemon-grass gravy), and that benchmark of Nyonya cuisine, ayam buah keluak – chicken braised in soy sauce together with savoury Indonesian black nuts. At least S$25/person, minus drinks. Daily noon–2.30pm & 6.30–10.30pm.

Clifford Pier 80 Collyer Quay 6597 5266; map. An upmarket restaurant majoring on a sort of nouvelle cuisine take on Southeast Asian street food: bak chor mee, sup kambing (Malay mutton soup), plus Hokkien kong bak bao (soy sauce pork eaten with steamed buns). There’s also a posh afternoon tea. Everything costs about four times what you’d pay at a food court, but then food courts don’t feature marble floors, a pianist tinkling away and the lofty, arched ceiling of the former boat terminal. Mon–Fri noon–2.30pm, 3.30–5.30pm & 6.30–10pm, Sat & Sun 11am–2pm, 3–5pm, 6.30–10.30pm.

Lau Pa Sat 18 Raffles Quay; map. The food court at this historic market building offers a real panoply of Singapore hawker food, including satay – vendors set up their barbecues just outside on Boon Tat St in the evenings. Pricier outlets offer cooked-to-order seafood such as chilli crab. Daily 24hr.

Lucha Loco 15 Duxton Hill 6226 3938, luchaloco.com; map. Popular with young expats, this Mexican joint does tacos and burritos at lunchtime, with the burritos dropped in favour of quesadillas and sharing platters in the evenings. Portions are on the small side, but they make amends with a buzzing garden drinking area where you can enjoy their vast range of margaritas. Tues–Fri noon–midnight, Sat 6pm–midnight.

The Populus Café 146 Neil Rd 6635 8420, thepopuluscafe.com; map. This slick, contemporary café is popular with young professional types for its gourmet coffee blends and fusion meals such as Korean beef with quinoa salad (from S$20). Mon 9am–7pm, Tues 9am–4pm, Wed–Fri 9am–10.30pm, Sat 9.30am–10.30pm, Sun 9.30am–7pm.

Marina Bay

The malls and fancy hotels scattered around Marina Bay hold some decent restaurants, though few are worth going out of your way for.

Cé La Vi SkyPark at Marina Bay Sands 6508 2188, sg.celavi.com; map. If you find that SkyPark admission charge hard to stomach, you can get round it by eating at this restaurant, serving Asian-influenced fusion food. Best to go for the set lunch (S$45 for two courses) as it can be very pricey otherwise. No shorts or vests in the evenings. Daily noon–3pm & 6–11pm.

Paulaner Bräuhaus #01–01 Millenia Walk, 9 Raffles Boulevard 6883 2572, paulaner.com.sg; map. The cavernous ceiling with a maypole sticking up into it is impressive, as is the menu of Bavarian delights such as the bitty spätzle pasta, but the best reason to come is the terrific Sunday brunch spread, including superb pork knuckle, sausages and salads, and desserts like strudel and cheesecake. It’s good value at S$68 with unlimited soft drinks, or S$80 with unlimited beer from their microbrewery. Bar daily noon–1am. Mon–Fri noon–2.30pm & 6.30–10.30pm, Sat 6.30–10.30pm, Sun 11.30am–2.30pm & 6.30–10.30pm.

Pizzeria Mozza #B01–42 Marina Bay Sands mall 6688 8522, singapore.pizzeriamozza.com; map. An excellent range of reasonably priced thin-crust pizzas starting at S$25, with plenty of salads, panini and soups, plus good desserts. Daily noon–11pm.

Singapore Food Treats Beneath the Singapore Flyer; map. Arguably more interesting than the Flyer itself, this retro-style food court evokes Singapore’s street-food scene of half a century ago, its stalls mocked up as pushcarts. The food can be retro too – for example satay bee hoon, rice vermicelli drenched in the peanut sauce normally eaten with satay, and popular in the 1970s. Nothing costs more than S$10. Daily 11am–11pm.

Orchard Road and around

Eating in Singapore’s shopping nexus – Orchard Rd, Tanglin Rd and Scotts Rd – is almost completely about restaurants in malls and hotels, though a few venues are housed in refurbished shophouses. Most malls have food courts, and indeed two of the island’s slickest are to be found here: Food Republic inside 313@Somerset, and Food Opera in the basement of ION Orchard.

Bistro Du Vin #01–14 Shaw Centre, 1 Scotts Rd 6733 7763, bistroduvin.com.sg; map. Informal French restaurant that does an exceptional duck leg confit, plus standards such as escargot and French onion soup – and none of that nouvelle cuisine presentation-over-substance nonsense either. The weekday lunch deals are reasonable value at S$35 for two courses; mains ordered à la carte cost just about as much. Daily noon–2pm & 6.30–10pm.

Brunetti #01–35 Tanglin Mall, 163 Tanglin Rd 6733 9088; map. An incredible Australian café with cabinet after cabinet of exquisite macaroons, cakes and ice creams that together come in almost as many colours as you’d find in a paint catalogue. Not too pricey – cheesecake costs S$8 – though the light meals and savoury snacks aren’t such good value. Mon–Thurs & Sun 9am–8pm, Fri & Sat 9am–9pm.

Maharajah 39 Cuppage Terrace 6732 6331, maharajah.com.sg; map. Amid the annoyingly touristy options on Cuppace Terrace is this pleasant North Indian restaurant with a tempting menu boasting many tandoori options such as chicken or lamb tikka, plus good snakehead fish curries. Around S$35/person without drinks. Daily 11am–11pm.

Marché Ground floor and basement, 313@Somerset, 313 Orchard Rd 6834 4041; map. Never mind that Mövenpick’s Marché restaurants are formulaic when you can have rösti, sausages or crêpes cooked to order in front of you, or help yourself to the superb salad bar. Daily lunch specials offer a meal and drink for around S$12, while the bakery counter does takeaway sandwiches (from S$5), bread sticks and Berliners, doughnuts with a range of fillings. Bakery from 7.30am. Daily 11am–11pm.

Min Jiang Goodwood Park Hotel, 22 Scotts Rd 6730 1704; map. This stylish affair serves some Cantonese food and lunchtime dim sum, though their spicy Sichuan specialities are the most interesting. Good choices include the prawn fried with dried chillies, and Sichuan smoked duck. Reasonably priced for a top hotel. Daily 11am–2.30pm & 6.30–10.30pm.

Newton Circus Hawker Centre Corner of Clemenceau Ave North and Bukit Timah Rd, near Newton MRT; map. A venerable open-air place with a wide range of hawker food. It’s especially noted for its seafood, for which you can end up paying through the nose; prices are on the high side for stalls anyway, as the place is very much on the tourist trail. Late afternoon until the early hours.

PS Café Level 2, Palais Renaissance, 390 Orchard Rd 9834 8232; pscafe.sg; map. Marvellous though pricey restaurant set in something resembling a glasshouse and offering an inventive, constantly revised menu of fusion fare and great desserts. Mains from S$30. Mon–Fri 11.30am–11pm, Sat & Sun 9.30am–11pm.

Sakae Teppenyaki #B2–52 Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Rd 6337 5676; map. One of many mini-restaurants squeezed into the shopping mall’s basement food court, with tables set around hot griddles all geared up to prepare teppanyaki, Japanese fry-ups of meat or seafood. Choose from various set combinations of ingredients and a chef will cook them with aplomb, and more than a dash of seasoning, in front of you. About S$20/person, excluding drinks. Daily 11.30am–9.30pm.

Spices Café Concorde Hotel, 100 Orchard Rd 6739 8370; map. Buffets galore: an evening seafood feast (Mon–Thurs S$62, Fri–Sun S$69), afternoon tea (Sat & Sun noon–4.30pm; S$42), and best of all, a great-value spread of Peranakan and other local cooking for lunch on weekdays (S$42). Daily 6am–11pm.

Thai Express #03–24 Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Rd 6339 5442, thaiexpress.com.sg; map. A modern chain with plenty of wood and chrome fittings and where everything is done chop-chop. The menu is packed with Thai rice and noodle standards (from S$12) plus lots of desserts. Daily 11am–10pm.

Warung M Nasir 69 Killiney Rd 6734 6228; map. Tiny but well-respected Indonesian nasi padang joint, with standards such as fried chicken balado, beef and chicken rendang and tofu or beans fried with sambal. Daily 10am–10pm.

DEMPSEY Hill (aka Tanglin village)

Dotted with old bungalows and the odd field, the stretch of Holland Rd 1km west of the Botanic Gardens’ Tanglin gate and 2km west of the start of Orchard Rd was originally a British army camp, which later housed Singapore’s Ministry of Defence. No one quite agrees on what to call the area now, but Dempsey Hill (dempseyhill.com) is worth a look for its jumble of posh restaurants and bars, plus health spas, antique shops and so forth. The venues here are close to the main road and can be reached on foot. Buses #7, #77 and #174 head past here from Orchard Boulevard.

Candlenut Block 17A, Dempsey Rd 1800 304 2288; map. It doesn’t look especially upmarket, but this restaurant lofts Peranakan food towards haute cuisine, with dishes like barramundi asam pedas (with chilli and turmeric). Everything still tastes recognizably Peranakan, just with all the flavours cranked up to eleven. Prices are correspondingly on the high side, too, at around S$40/person minus drinks. Mon–Thurs & Sun noon–3pm & 6–10pm, Fri & Sat noon–3pm & 6–11pm.

Long Beach Seafood Block 25, Dempsey Rd 6323 2222, longbeachseafood.com.sg; map. Once you had to trek to the beaches to find Singapore’s best Chinese-style seafood, but no longer, now that this beachside stalwart has set up here. The best dishes really are magic, including treacly crisp baby squid, chunky Alaska crab in a white pepper sauce, steamed soon hock (goby) and, of course, chilli crab. An expensive but worthwhile blowout. Daily 11am–3pm & 5pm–1am.

Samy’s Block 25, Dempsey Rd 6472 2080; map. Housed in a colonial-era hall with ceiling fans whirring overhead, Samy’s is an institution that’s been serving superb banana-leaf meals for decades. Choose from curries of jumbo prawn, fish head, crab or mutton, and either plain rice or the delicate, fluffy biriyani. You can eat well for S$20/person excluding drinks. Mon & Wed–Sun 11am–3pm & 6–10pm.

Geylang and Katong

In line with their heritage, the suburbs of Geylang and Katong hold several inexpensive Nyonya and Malay restaurants.

328 Katong Laksa 51 East Coast Rd, at the corner of Ceylon Rd; map. Just as different parts of Malaysia have their own take on laksa, so does Katong: here the noodles are cut into short strands for easy slurping off a spoon. Run by a brother-and-sister team, this café is regarded as one of the original purveyors of the dish, using seafood and without the meat of more modern variations. Daily 8am–10pm.

Guan Hoe Soon 38/40 Joo Chiat Place 6344 2761, guanhoesoon.com; map. Open in one form or another for more than half a century, this restaurant turns out fine Nyonya cuisine in home-cooked style, including yummy ngoh hiang, in which minced prawn is rolled up in a wrapper made from bean curd, and satay babi – not a Malay satay, but a sweetish red pork curry. Around S$25/person. Daily 11am–3pm & 6–9.30pm.

Hajjah Maimunah 20 Joo Chiat Rd 6348 5457, hjmaimunah.com; map Inexpensive Malay diner serving good breakfasts (nasi lemak etc) and a fine nasi campur spread, featuring the likes of ayam bakar sunda (Sundanese-style barbecued chicken), with assorted kuih for afters. Tues–Sun 8am–9pm.

Sandwich Saigon 93 East Coast Rd 6345 3849, sandwichsaigon.com; map. Katong has both gentrified and become a little Vietnam, eating-wise, in recent years. This restaurant stands out for its yummy Vietnamese baguettes, using bread baked on the premises and with fillings such as garlic chicken or pork chop (around S$8). Also well-executed spring rolls and noodle dishes (S$10), plus drip coffee. Mon–Fri 11.30am–2.30pm & 5.30–10pm, Sat & Sun 11.30am–10pm.

Sentosa and vivocity

There are few choices for cheap food on Sentosa (one is a simple food court at Palawan Beach), so if you’re keen to keep costs down, try the VivoCity mall above HarbourFront MRT.

Food Republic Level 3 VivoCity. Perhaps the best example of this upmarket food court, where the stalls are “curated” for their culinary calibre and the stalls styled to resemble something out of pre-war Chinatown. Try the scissors-cut curry rice – mixed rice/nasi campur but with the hawker slicing up the rice serving with scissors and heaping curry gravy onto it. Avoid at peak times, though, as the place will be rammed. Daily 10am–10pm.

Slappy Cakes Close to Universal Studios 6795 0779, slappycakes.com.sg. A great place to bring kids: you pick a batter (chocolate or zucchini, say), then something to add to the mix (strawberries or ham, anyone?), and finally prepare pancakes at your table’s griddle. It’s good fun and if the results aren’t up to scratch, well at least you won’t have anyone to get cross with other than yourself. One order (S$15) will make enough for two as a snack. Light meals also available. Daily 8am–9.30pm.

Soup #02–141 VivoCity 6376 9969. So-called samsui women once sailed from China’s Guangdong province to work on Singapore building sites. This fine little restaurant celebrates the cuisine of these redoubtable women, most famously their ginger chicken; steamed, it comes with a gingery dip and iceberg-lettuce leaves to roll it up in. Reckon on S$25/person, excluding drinks. Daily 11.30am–10pm.

Trapizza Siloso Beach 6376 2662. Trapizza stands out from the many eating places here for its excellent pizzas and pasta dishes starting at S$20. Daily 11.30am–9.30pm.

Drinking and nightlife

Singapore supports a huge range of watering holes, from elegant colonial chambers through hip rooftop venues with skyline views to slightly tacky joints featuring Chinese karaoke or middling bands covering Western hits. Chinatown is particularly good for bars, though anywhere expats hang out won’t be short of options. There are also a handful of glitzy clubs that spin cutting-edge sounds, all minus – this being Singapore – any assistance from illicit substances. Although the scene has come off the boil in recent years, one or two venues still lure world-leading DJs.

Essentials

Bars Some surveys deem Singapore one of the world’s most expensive cities for drinking, but the reality is more subtle. It’s true that a 630ml bottle (1.1 imperial or 1.4 US pints) of Tiger beer at a bar or club typically costs around S$14, but hawker centres charge only half that, and some bars thrive on selling keenly priced drinks. A glass of house wine usually costs much the same as a beer, and spirits a few dollars more. During happy hour, which can last half the evening, you’ll either get a considerable discount off drinks or a “one-for-one” deal (two drinks for the price of one), and some bars also have a “house pour”, a discounted cocktail, wine or beer on offer all night. Note that some bars close on Sundays, and that more upmarket venues, including hotel bars, often have a “smart casual” dress code: generally no shorts, vests or sandals after 6pm.

Clubs Most clubs have a cover charge, if not all week then at least on Friday and Saturday; the charge almost always includes your first drink or two, and varies between S$15 and S$35 (weekends are pricier, and men pay slightly more than women). Where women get in free on ladies’ night (often midweek), they have to pay for their first drink but may get unlimited refills of the “house pour” at certain times.

Drinking laws Following an extraordinary riot in Little India in 2013, which the government saw as fuelled by alcohol (although it was sparked by a fatal road accident involving migrant workers), restrictions were placed on drinking in public. In practice, this means anywhere on the street beyond the premises of restaurants, hawker centres, bars and clubs, plus beaches and parks, and applies nightly from 10.30pm to 7am. Within Little India and Geylang, an additional ban applies throughout the weekend and until 7am on Mondays. Shops and supermarkets are also unable to sell alcohol when the ban is in force.

Bars

The Colonial District

Aura Sky Lounge Level 6, National Gallery, St Andrew’s Rd 6866 1977, aura.sg; map. Come here for one of the very best views of any bar in Singapore, out over the Padang with Marina Bay Sands, Esplanade and the Singapore Flyer beyond; after dark is best. Happy hour Mon–Thurs & Sun 5–8pm. Daily 11.30am–1am.

Tap Craft Beer Bar Ground floor, Capitol Piazza, 15 Stamford Rd 6384 7188, tapthat.com.sg; map. Part of the grand redevelopment of the 1920s Capitol theatre into a mall and luxury hotel, this open-plan venue takes up part of the mall concourse and is especially popular with executive types, who come for its truly eclectic range of imported beers and ciders. Bar bites include spam fries and teriyaki meatballs, and regular promotions help keep costs down. Daily noon–midnight.

Bras Basah Road to Rochor Road

The Long Bar Raffles Hotel, 1 Beach Rd 6412 1816; map. It’s still just about mandatory to have a Singapore Sling amid the old-fashioned elegance of the bar where Ngiam Tong Boon invented it in 1915. Daily 11am–12.30am.

Loof Top of the Odeon Towers Extension, 391 North Bridge Rd #03–07 6338 8035, loof.com.sg; map. This rooftop garden bar is an elegant place to chill out, with views into the back of the Raffles hotel opposite. There’s a strong local flavour too, in the form of cocktails and bar snacks that use lots of Southeast Asian ingredients, plus a nostalgic recreation of an old neighbourhood shop selling knick-knacks. Happy hour weekdays until 8pm. Mon–Thurs 5pm–1am, Fri & Sat 5pm–3am.

Little India and Arab St

Atlas Ground floor, Parkview Square, 600 North Bridge Rd #03–07 6396 4466, atlasbar.sg; map. Aptly located at the Gotham-esque Parkview Square, Atlas is a palatially opulent evocation of Jazz Age glamour, all gilt Art Deco-style fittings. Cabinets stretching to the lofty ceiling hold a veritable library of wines and spirits, including some fiendishly expensive vintages. If you don’t feel like indulging, just come for a daytime coffee and a gawp. Mon–Thurs 10am–1am, Fri 10am–2am, Sat 3pm–2am.

The Countryside Café 71 Dunlop St 6292 0071; map. A low-key, convivial establishment, with middle-of-the-road oldie sounds and five dozen different bottled beers at reasonable prices. The menu of bar snacks and food – partly Indian, partly Western – is nearly as impressive. Mon 6pm–2am, Tues–Thurs & Sun 10am–2am, Fri & Sat 10am–3am.

Prince of Wales 101 Dunlop St 6299 0130, pow.com.sg; map. This travellers’ bar has frequent discount deals on top of already attractive beer and cider prices, plus regular acoustic sets and the occasional quiz night. Mon–Thurs 5pm–late, Fri–Sun 3pm–late.

Chinatown, including Boat Quay & Riverside Point

BQ Bar 39 Boat Quay 6536 1571, bqbar.com; map. One of Boat Quay’s cooler venues, thanks to the friendly staff, memorable views of the river from upstairs and diverse sounds, anything from dance to rock. Kebabs available too from a nearby outlet run by the same management. Happy hour until 8pm. Mon & Tues 11am–1am, Wed–Fri 11am–3am, Sat 5pm–3am.

Harry’s Bar 28 Boat Quay 6538 3029, harrys.com.sg; map. Singapore’s most ubiquitous chain of bars started out here, and now has some twenty branches island-wide. Popular with locals as well as foreigners, it does half a dozen draught beers and ciders, plus light meals and snacks; happy hour is until 8pm. Mon–Thurs & Sun 11.30am–1am, Fri & Sat 11.30am–2am.

The Penny Black 26 & 27 Boat Quay 6538 2300, pennyblack.com.sg; map. Hardly a convincing evocation of a “Victorian London pub” but pleasant enough, with one table built around a red pillar box, Strongbow cider on draught, plenty of pub grub – steak pie, ploughman’s lunches, etc – and live UK football matches on TV. Mon–Thurs 11.30am–1am, Fri & Sat 11.30am–2am, Sun 11.30am–midnight.

Red Dot Brewhouse 33 & 34 Boat Quay 6535 4500, reddotbewhouse.com.sg; map. Many of Singapore’s slicker bars are expat-run, but not the Red Dot Brewhouse, the brainchild of one local who got bitten by the homebrew bug many years ago. Among their range of beers and ales, the most radical is the Monster Green Lager, rich in blue-green algae regarded by some as a superfood. Mon–Thurs noon–midnight, Fri noon–2am, Sat 3pm–1am.

Screening Room 12 Ann Siang Hill 6221 1694, screeningroom.com.sg; map. The unpretentious rooftop bar here is a convivial spot for an evening drink, with the bonus of views of Chinatown’s shophouses and modern towers, plus plenty of Mediterranean-influenced snacks. Mon–Thurs 6pm–late, Fri & Sat 6pm–3am.

Spiffy Dapper Upstairs at 73 Amoy St 8655 0829, spiffydapper.com; map. This tiny indie cocktail bar must be the darkest venue in town, its thick drapes keeping out any extraneous lighting. There are at least fifteen standard cocktails on offer (from S$25), and the mixologists can talk through these and other options based on your tastes. Mon–Fri 5pm–late, Sat & Sun 3pm–late.

Stickies 11 Keng Cheow St 6221 1694, stickiesbar.com; map. No fancy decor or fittings here, but the place is often packed with a young, mainly local, crowd thanks to its many discount deals. The most striking offer is hourly pricing on its daily house pour (including beer): they charge S$2 at 2pm, S$3 at 3pm and so on (plus taxes), the idea being to get people to ease off late at night. Daily noon–midnight.

Tanjong pagar and the financial district

1-Altitude Levels 61–63, One Raffles Place 6438 0410, 1-altitude.com; map. Whether or not this is “the world’s highest alfresco bar” as claimed, the views from the roof of the One Raffles Place tower, 282m up, are simply stunning. It’s best to drop by towards the end of your stay, when you can make sense of the cityscape and ponder the myriad changes that half a century of rapid development has wrought. Cover charge S$30 (S$35 after 9pm); smart-casual dress only. Hours can vary. Daily 6pm–2am.

Five Oriental 16 Collyer Quay 9826 1049, fivebarsg; map. Thronged with banking staff, this bar bizarrely incorporates two escalators sandwiching the bar area itself and an elevated stage for live music. As befits its name, there’s a S$5 deal round the clock, paying for a glass of their house pour spirit or half-pint of Kronenbourg. A full menu of dim sum and other Cantonese food, too. Mon–Fri noon–midnight, Sat 6pm–midnight.

Marina Bay

Orgo Roof terrace, Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay 6336 9366, orgo.sg; map. They make a big thing of their huge range of cocktails, which emphasize fresh fruit and herbs, but the views of the spires of the Financial District sell themselves. Happy hour until 8pm. Daily 6pm–late.

Orchard Road and around

Quite a few of Orchard Rd’s most interesting drinking spots occupy restored Peranakan shophouses at the start of Emerald Hill Rd, close to Somerset MRT.

Alley Bar Peranakan Place, corner of Orchard Rd and Emerald Hill Rd 6732 6966, peranakanplace.com; map. Less touristy than its neighbours, Alley Bar slots into a narrow, high-ceilinged space and does a good range of cocktails and spirits. The food menu is extensive, too, with lots of sandwiches and more substantial meals. Happy hour until 9pm. Mon–Thurs & Sun 5pm–2am, Fri & Sat 5pm–3am.

Ice Cold Beer 9 Emerald Hill Rd 6735 9929, www.ice-cold-beer.com; map. Noisy, happening place where the beers are kept in ice tanks under the glass-topped bar. Leffe Blond and Fuller’s London Pride on tap, among others. Happy hour until 9pm. Shares a kitchen with No. 5 Emerald Hill. Happy hour daily 5–9pm. Mon–Thurs & Sun 5pm–2am, Fri & Sat 5pm–3am.

No. 5 Emerald Hill 5 Emerald Hill Rd 6732 0818, emerald-hill.com; map. Set in one of Emerald Hill Rd’s restored houses, No. 5 is not only an opulent feast for the eyes but also offers speciality cocktails plus great chicken wings and thin-crust pizzas. Tetley’s on tap, some outdoor seating and a pool table upstairs. Happy hour until 9pm. Mon–Thurs noon–2am, Fri & Sat noon–3am, Sun 5pm–3am.

Martini Bar Grand Hyatt Hotel, 10 Scotts Rd 6732 1234; map. Choose from several dozen martini variations at this plush bar, ranging from their trademark lychee martini to options that include local ingredients such as sugar cane. Several are half-price before 9pm, when you can order one for a mere S$17. Mon–Thurs & Sun 5pm–midnight, Fri & Sat 5pm–1am.

Que Pasa 7 Emerald Hill 6235 6626, www.quepasa.com.sg; map. A wine bar with a creaky wooden staircase and plenty of tapas. No happy hour. Mon–Thurs 1.30pm–2am, Fri & Sat 1.30pm–3am, Sun 5.30pm–2am.

Dempsey Hill

The Rabbit Hole 39C Harding Rd 6473 9965, thewhiterabbit.com.sg; map. From house of God to gin palace: that’s the tale of the Rabbit Hole, the marvellous open-air bar at the back of the restored church which now holds the upmarket White Rabbit restaurant. There are over twenty types of gin and a dozen gin-based cocktails to navigate your way around, as well as plenty of premium wines. Mon–Thurs & Sun 6pm–11.30pm, Fri & Sat 6pm–12.30am.

Sentosa

Mambo Beach Club Siloso Beach, opposite the Siloso Beach Resort 6276 6270, mambobeachclub.com.sg. Fancy yet friendly establishment where you can imbibe sundowners at outdoor tables clustered around the freeform pool, with the sea just metres away. Seafood bites and pizzas (from S$20), too. Hours can vary. Daily 11am–9pm.

Clubs

Canvas #B1-06 The Riverwalk, 20 Upper Circular Rd 6538 2928, canvasvenue.sg; map. On the south bank of the Singapore River, Canvas spins hip-hop, electronica and other sounds depending on the evening, but Tuesdays sees stand-up comedy rule the roost. Tues 8–11pm, Wed–Sat 8pm–late.

Cé La Vi Marina Bay Sands SkyPark 6508 2188, sg.celavi.com; map. The bar/club at the SkyPark is one way to bypass the 57th-floor admission fee and enjoy fabulous views over downtown Singapore. There’s a S$20 entry charge until 9pm, redeemable against food and drink, and a post-midnight cover charge certain days. Daily noon–late.

Tanjong Beach Club Tanjong Beach, Sentosa 6270 1355, tanjongbeachclub.com. If you needed a reason to schlep to the furthest of Sentosa’s beaches, this would be it. Styled like a luxury beach bungalow, it boasts an incongruous infinity pool, a pricey restaurant and a bar that hosts weekly beach parties (usually Sun from 2pm). Mon noon–10pm, Tues–Fri 11am–10pm, Sat 10am–10pm, Sun 10am–11pm.

Zouk The Cannery, Clarke Quay, 3C River Valley Rd 6738 2988, zoukclub.com; map. Still going after more than 25 years, Zouk is Singapore’s pre-eminent club, specializing in house and other dance sounds. Its new home at Clarke Quay, oozing post-industrial chic, is four venues in one, including two bars and its little-sister club Phuture, where the emphasis is more on hip-hop and R&B. Wed & Fri 9pm–3am, Sat 9pm–4am,

LGBT venues

Singapore’s LGBT scene, though modest, is among the best in Southeast Asia, and in recent years the country has seen the annual Pink Dot rally (June or July; pinkdot.sg) – an LGBT event, although this being Singapore it’s all tame and family-friendly – grow into one of the best-attended mass meetings on the island. That said, attitudes toward homosexuality remain contradictory. The government has declined to repeal colonial-era legislation banning sex between men, though it no longer enforces it either, and in 2017 ordered multinationals to stop sponsoring Pink Dot and banned tourists from participating, suggesting it wants to isolate the domestic social agenda from international trends. So it is that gay venues still keep a low profile, functioning largely unhindered but scarcely using the word “gay” in advertising. The scene centres on Chinatown and Tanjong Pagar, where there are some half a dozen bars and clubs; note that they only really get busy at weekends, and only after 10pm. Two sources of information are the Pelangi Pride Centre (a small gay library project near Commonwealth MRT; pelangipridecentre.org) and, for lesbian events, facebook.com/twoqueensasia.

Dorothy’s 13A Trengganu St; map. Entered through a side door in Temple St (look for the discreetly placed rainbow flag), this tiny bar offers a view over the souvenir stalls of Trengganu St. Daily 6pm–late.

DYMK 41 Neil Rd 6224 3965; map. Probably the friendliest gay bar in town. They tend to keep the music a tad quieter than elsewhere, making it a good place for a relaxed chat. Most of the crowd are 20- and 30-somethings. Mon–Thurs & Sun 6pm–midnight, Fri 7pm–1am, Sat 8pm–2am.

Tantric 78 Neil Rd 6423 9232; map. Pleasant enough shophouse bar with a clientele slightly more reflective of Singapore’s multi-ethnic make-up than the largely Chinese crowd elsewhere. There’s outdoor seating on a slick terrace, and upstairs, a nominally separate bar that’s a mini-shrine to the pre-war American Chinese actress Anna May Wong. Daily 8pm–late.

Entertainment

Even on a brief visit, it’s hard not to notice how much state money has been poured into the arts: prime property has been turned over to cultural organizations in areas like the Waterloo St “arts belt”, and prestigious venues such as Theatres on the Bay host world-class performers. Cynics might say this cultural push is mainly about keeping Singapore attractive to expats, while others raise the important issue of whether world-class art can bloom where censorship is very much alive. Nonetheless, the cultural scene is streets ahead of anything in Malaysia, so it would be a shame not to catch a performance of some kind, whether one drawing on Asian traditions or a gig by a big-name Western band.

Street theatre

Walk around Singapore long enough and you’re likely to stumble upon some sort of streetside cultural event, most usually a wayang – a Malay word used in Singapore to denote Chinese opera. Played out on outdoor stages next to temples and markets, or in open spaces in the new towns, wayangs are highly dramatic and stylized affairs, in which garishly made-up characters enact popular Chinese legends to the accompaniment of the crashes of cymbals and gongs. They’re staged throughout the year, but the best time to catch one is during the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts, when they are performed to entertain passing spooks. Another fascinating traditional performance – lion-dancing – takes to the streets during Chinese New Year, and puppet theatres may appear around then, too. Downtown, Chinatown and the Bugis/Waterloo Street area are where you’re most likely to stumble upon performances.

Essentials

Festivals Major cultural festivals include the Singapore International Festival of the Arts (calendar online; sifa.sg), running the gamut from concerts to theatre through dance and film; and the Singapore Fringe Festival (Jan or Feb; singaporefringe.com), which concentrates on theatre, dance and the visual arts. There’s also the annual Singapore Writers’ Festival (singaporewritersfestival.com), featuring international as well as local writers working in all four of the country’s official languages.

Tickets You can buy tickets directly from venues or through the SISTIC ticket agency, with outlets in downtown malls (6348 5555, sistic.com.sg).

Film

As well as the latest Hollywood blockbusters, Singapore’s cinemas show a range of Chinese, Malay and Indian movies, all with English subtitles. Although international cinema features year-round in one-off screenings and mini-film festivals, the main event for cineastes is the Singapore International Film Festival (usually Nov; sgiff.com). If you’re watching a hot new release, it’s worth turning up early or buying tickets in advance. Tickets start at S$10, but can cost two or three times that for blockbuster films or screenings at the fanciest multiplexes. Be prepared for a certain amount of chattering during shows.

Multiplex chains

Cathay Cinemas include: Cineleisure Orchard, 8 Grange Rd (near Somerset MRT); Cathay Cineplex, 2 Handy Rd (near Dhoby Ghaut MRT); cathaycineplexes.com.sg.

Golden Village Cinemas include: Level 7, Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Rd; Levels 2 & 3, VivoCity, Harbourfront; gv.com.sg.

Shaw Cinemas include: Lido 8 Cineplex, Shaw House, 350 Orchard Rd (IMAX-equipped); Bugis Cineplex, Bugis Junction, 200 Victoria St; shaw.sg.

Independent venues

Alliance Française 1 Sarkies Rd alliancefrancaise.org.sg. Weekly French-language films with English subtitles. A 10min walk from Newton MRT.

Filmgarde Cineplex Level 5, Bugis+, 201 Victoria St fgcineplex.com.sg. Relatively commercial for an indie, with both English- and Chinese-language flicks.

National Museum Cinematheque National Museum, 93 Stamford Rd nationalmuseum.sg. Intermittent screenings of vintage classics, some free.

The Projector Level 5, Golden Mile Tower, 6001 Beach Rd 6337 8181, theprojector.sg. Lurking within a concrete parking deck is the island’s best cinema, an unmodernized 1970s affair lovingly revived with just some fresh coats of paint and cool murals. Devoted to films from around the world, it also sports two bars, one with views of Marina Centre.

The Screening Room 12 Ann Siang Hill 6221 1694, screeningroom.com.sg. This posh restaurant/bar complex incorporates a cinema screening the relatively intellectual end of Hollywood’s output.

Theatre

A surprising number of small drama companies have sprung up over the years, performing works by local playwrights that dare to include a certain amount of social commentary; watch out for productions by The Necessary Stage (necessary.org), the Singapore Repertory Theatre (srt.com.sg) and Theatreworks (theatreworks.org.sg). Foreign companies visit occasionally, too, and a lavish musical is usually staged at least once a year.

Classical and traditional music and dance

At the heart of Singapore’s healthy Western classical music scene is the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, whose concerts often feature stellar guest soloists, conductors and choirs from around the world. Dance is another thriving art form, with several active local troupes and regular visits by international companies.

Companies and orchestras

Chinese Opera Teahouse 5 Smith St 6323 4862, ctcopera.com.sg. A touristy show of Chinese opera excerpts ($S40 with dinner beforehand, or S$25 with just tea and snacks); things kick off Fri & Sat at 7.50pm, or 7pm with dinner included.

Singapore Chinese Orchestra Singapore Conference Hall, 7 Shenton Way, Financial District 6440 3839, sco.com.sg. Traditional Chinese music concerts, with occasional free shows.

Singapore Dance Theatre 6338 0611, singaporedancetheatre.com. Contemporary and classical works at various venues, sometimes by moonlight at Fort Canning Park.

Singapore Lyric Opera singaporeopera.com.sg. Western opera and operetta, at various venues.

Singapore Symphony Orchestra sso.org.sg. Performances at Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay and the Victoria Concert Hall. Occasional free concerts at the Botanic Gardens and hour-long daytime shows for children.

Siong Leng Musical Association 6222 4221, siongleng.com. A body dedicated to preserving nanyin (literally “southern sound”) – the distinctive music and opera of southeast China, sung in dialect. A few shows each year at various locations, sometimes in the exceptional temple surroundings of Thian Hock Keng.

Temple of Fine Arts 6535 0509, tfasg.org. This Indian cultural organization puts on occasional concerts and exhibitions.

Pop, rock, blues and jazz

Singapore is firmly on the East Asian gig circuit for Western stadium-rock outfits as well as indie bands, though some gigs can be a bit staid, with locals wary about letting their hair down. Local bands do exist and some aren’t at all bad, but these are more likely to perform in community centres rather than decent venues. Music festivals include Laneway, a satellite of the well-established Australian indie event (Jan; singapore.lanewayfestival.com); the Singapore Jazz Festival, which spans world music as well (March/April; sing-jazz.com) and Baybeats, an Esplanade event focused on Asian indie (dates vary). Canto- and Mando-pop – bland hybrids of Chinese lyrics and Western pop – as well as K-pop are hugely popular, too.

Independent venues

Blu Jaz Café 11 Bali Lane 6292 3800, blujazcafe.net. Live jazz Wed, Fri & Sat eves. Mon & Fri noon–1.30am, Tues–Thurs noon–12.30am, Sat 4pm–1.30am.

Crazy Elephant #01–03 Block E, Clarke Quay 6337 7859, crazyelephant.com. Of the hotchpotch of brash venues along Clarke Quay, this bar has a tad more street cred, with live music – blues and rock – practically every night and an open-mike jam session on Sun. Some tables are by the water’s edge. Happy hour until 9pm. Mon–Thurs & Sun 5pm–2am, Fri & Sat 5pm–3am.

Timbre The Arts House, 1 Old Parliament Lane 6336 3386, timbre.com.sg. Sets by local musicians in a high-visibility riverside location. Daily 6pm–midnight.

Shopping

Choice and convenience make the Singapore shopping experience a rewarding one, but the island’s affluence and strong currency mean most things are priced at Western levels; Kuala Lumpur can be a better hunting ground for bargains. If you’re around during the Great Singapore Sale (late May to late July; greatsingaporesale.com.sg), you may find prices seriously marked down in many stores. Orchard Road, of course, is home to the biggest and swankiest malls; more interesting are those in Chinatown, which are often like multistorey markets and house more traditional outlets stocking Chinese foodstuffs, medicines, instruments and porcelain. Chinatown also has a few antique and curio shops along South Bridge Rd, and more knick-knacks are on sale around Arab St, where you’ll also find textiles and batiks, robust basketware and some good deals on jewellery. Little India has silk stores and goldsmiths as well as the Mustafa Centre, a department store that’s known all over the island for being open 24/7. Shopping complexes, malls and department stores are almost all open daily from 10am–9pm, some until 10pm.

Essentials

Complaints In the unlikely event that you encounter a problem with a retailer that you cannot resolve mutually, you may be able to recover your money by initiating proceedings online with Singapore’s Small Claims Tribunal; see statecourts.gov.sg for more information.

Tax refunds On leaving the country by air or sea, tourists can claim a refund of Singapore’s goods and services tax (GST; seven percent at the time of research) on purchases over S$100, provided the shop in question is a member of one of three tax refund schemes. You will either have to complete a form which must be signed by the retailer, and then present the goods, forms and receipts to the customs authorities when you leave, or else ask the shop to link your purchases to one of your debit or credit cards, in which case you claim the tax back by, for example, scanning a barcode at a booth at the airport. It’s a bureaucratic headache; for detailed guidance, have a look at the GST section of iras.gov.sg, or pick up the appropriate leaflet from a tourist office.

Malls and department stores

Orchard Road and around

313@Somerset 313 Orchard Rd (above Somerset MRT) 313somerset.com.sg; map. Muji and Zara are the star names here.

Forum the Shopping Mall 583 Orchard Rd forumtheshoppingmall.com; map. Plenty of items to please the most pampered of children– upmarket kids’ clothes, toys and so forth.

The Heeren 260 Orchard Rd; map. There’s really only one reason to come here – it’s home to the flagship outlet of Robinsons, Singapore’s oldest department store.

ION Orchard 2 Orchard Turn (above Orchard MRT) ionorchard.com; map. Despite the impressive hyper-modern facade, 55th-floor viewing gallery and sprinkling of designer names, by far the most popular section of this cavernous mall is Food Opera, its excellent food court on basement 4.

Ngee Ann City 391A Orchard Rd ngeeanncity.com.sg; map. A brooding twin-towered complex, home to the Japanese Takashimaya department store and the excellent Kinokuniya bookstore, plus several jewellers.

Plaza Singapura 68 Orchard Rd plazasingapura.com.sg; map. Veteran mall with a bit of everything: the British Marks & Spencer department store, sports equipment, Yamaha musical instruments and electronic equipment.

Tanglin Shopping Centre 19 Tanglin Rd (next to Orchard Parade hotel) tanglinsc.com; map. Good for art, antiques and curios.

Tangs Corner of Orchard and Scotts rds tangs.com; map. Tangs is a department store dating back to the 1950s, and the only one to have its own building on Orchard Rd, topped by a pagoda-style construction occupied by the Marriott hotel. The store itself sells a wide range of reasonably priced clothes and accessories.

The Colonial District

Raffles City 252 North Bridge Rd (above City Hall MRT) rafflescity.com; map. Home to a branch of Robinsons department store with a Marks & Spencer within it, plus numerous fashion chains.

Bras Basah Road to Rochor Road

Bugis Junction Victoria St, above Bugis MRT bugisjunction-mall.com.sg; map. Mall encasing several streets of restored shophouses, and featuring the Japanese/Chinese department store BHG.

Sim Lim Square 1 Rochor Canal Rd simlimsquare.com.sg; map. Cameras and electronic goods.

Little India

Mustafa Centre Syed Alwi Rd mustafa.com.sg; map. Totally different in feel to the malls of Orchard Rd, Mustafa is a phenomenon, selling electronics, fresh food, luggage, you name it – and it never closes. Daily 24hr.

Chinatown

Hong Lim Complex 531–531A Upper Cross St; map. One of several Chinatown shopping centres where ordinary people buy ordinary things – dried mushrooms, cuttlefish and crackers from provisions shops, for example.

People’s Park Centre 101 Upper Cross St; map. Chinese handicrafts, electronics, silk, jade and gold.

People’s Park Complex 1 Park Rd; map. A venerable shopping centre that, like the Hong Lim Complex and adjacent People’s Park Centre, is among the most entertaining places to browse in Chinatown because it’s so workaday. Also here is the Overseas Emporium on level 4, selling Chinese musical instruments, calligraphy brushes, lacquerwork and jade.

Marina Bay

The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands 10 Bayfront Ave; map. Beneath the iconic hotel, this mall actually has its own “canal” for boat rides, as well as the usual designer names.

Elsewhere in Singapore

VivoCity Next to HarbourFront Centre and above HarbourFront MRT vivocity.com.sg. A humdinger of a mall, containing a branch of Tangs department store, a cinema, three food courts and many restaurants.

Art, antiques, curios and souvenirs

Antiques of the Orient #02–40 Tanglin Shopping Centre 6734 9351, aoto.com.sg; map. Antiquarian books and maps, engravings and old photos. Mon–Sat 10am–5.30pm, Sun 11am–3.30pm.

Arch #02-07 Esplanade Mall 6338 0161, archsingapore.com.sg; map. Their secretive production process works magic on thin slices of wood, transforming them into intricately carved and etched pieces of artwork, often Singapore-themed, that can be framed for your wall or worn as jewellery. A small shophouse facade starts at around S$25, while a 20cm-wide Marina Bay panorama can cost S$250 or more. Daily 11.30am–7.30pm.

Aster By Kyra 168 Telok Ayer St 6684 8600, asterbykyra.sg; map. This little shop sells Peranakan-style scarves and porcelain, but its mainstay is lovely shophouse tiles – Indonesian replicas start at S$12, whereas costs for period ones rescued from old buildings hit three figures if in good condition. Daily 10.30am–6.30pm.

East Inspirations 33 Pagoda St 6224 2993; map. The classiest of several antique shops here, offering Asian furniture, porcelain lamps and vases. Daily 10.30am–6.30pm.

The Heritage Shop 93 Jalan Sultan 6223 7982, theheritageshop.sg; map. An incredible range of bric-a-brac, from antique radios to beautiful enamelware tiffin carriers – little pots for cooked food, stacked and held together within a metal frame for easy carrying. Daily 1.30–8pm.

Jamal Kazura Aromatics 21 Bussorah St 6293 3320; map. Veteran maker and seller of alcohol-free perfume, using various essential oils – a small Arabian-style bottle of scent starts at around S$12. Mon–Thurs, Sat & Sun 9.30am–7pm, Fri 9.30am–1pm & 2pm–7pm.

Katong Antiques House 208 East Coast Rd 6345 8544; map. Peranakan artefacts and Chinese porcelain. Tues–Sun 11am–5pm.

Kwok Gallery #03–01 Far East Shopping Centre, 545 Orchard Rd 6235 2516; map. An impressive inventory of traditional Chinese pottery, jade and sculpture. Mon–Sat 11am–6pm.

Little Shophouse 43 Bussorah St, near Sultan Mosque 6295 2328; map. Well named, this small outlet boasts some fine but pricey examples of Peranakan beaded slippers (from S$300), plus replica Peranakan crockery. Daily 11am–6pm.

Malay Art Gallery 31 Bussorah St 6294 8051, themalayartgallery.com; map. Stocks songket and kerises from Malaysia and Indonesia. Sometimes closed Sundays. Mon–Sat noon–8pm, Sun noon–6pm.

Naiise #B1-08 The Cathay, 2 Handy Rd naiise.sg; map. This homeware/stationery shop has a whole section devoted to witty Singapore-themed souvenirs: durian coin bowls, plates bearing recipes for classic hawker dishes, even shophouse-tile Rubik’s cubes. Daily noon–10pm.

Orchid Chopsticks 25 Trengganu St 6227 0662; map. You’d never have thought chopsticks could be this interesting: here they come in just about every material and hue, some fairly plain, others lustrous and ornamented. Daily 10am–10pm.

Ratianah 23 Bussorah St 6392 0323; map. Friendly Malay shop offering Nyonya- style fabrics and blouses, plus bangles and brooches. Mon–Sat 12.30–9pm, Sun 1–5pm.

Red Dot Design Museum 11 Marina Boulevard 6514 0111, museum.red-dot.sg; map. A good place for quirky, ergonomically designed items, including household gadgets, plus jewellery and paper artworks for self-assembly. Daily 11am–2am.

Rishi Handicrafts 5 Baghdad St 6298 2408; map. Specializes in a range of baskets made from rattan, bamboo and other materials, plus some knick-knacks, too. Mon–Sat 10am–5.30pm, Sun 11am–5.30pm.

Teajoy #01–05 North Bridge Centre, 420 North Bridge Rd 6339 3739; map. Close to the National Library, this specializes Chinese Song-dynasty-style tea sets. Daily noon–8pm.

Tong Mern Sern 51 Craig Rd 6223 1037, tmsantiques.com; map. “We buy junk and sell antiques”, proclaims the banner outside this great little establishment. The owner is quite a character and can tell you all about the crockery, old furniture and other bric-a-brac he has amassed. Mon–Sat 9am–6pm, Sun 1–6pm.

Zhen Lacquer Gallery 1 Trengganu St 6222 2718; map. Specializes in lacquerware boxes and bowls. Daily 10.30am–9pm.

Jewellery

C.T. Hoo #01–22 Tanglin Shopping Centre 6737 5447; map. Specializes in pearls. Mon–Sat 9.30am–6.30pm.

Flower Diamond #03–02 Ngee Ann City 6734 1221, flowerdiamond.com; map. Contemporary designs as well as more traditionally styled bling, at sensible prices. Daily 10am–9pm.

Risis National Orchid Garden, Singapore Botanic Gardens 6475 5104, risis.com; map. Singaporeans tend to view gold-plated orchids – available as brooches, pendants, earrings, even on tie clips – as clichéd, but tourists snap them up here as well as at Changi Airport. Daily 8.45am–6.30pm.

Wong’s Jewellery 62 Temple St, Chinatown 6323 0236; map. Chinese-style outlet, good for jade, gold and pearls. Daily 10am–7.30pm.

Fabrics and Fashion

Charles & Keith Several outlets, including #B3–58 ION Orchard 6238 1840; map. Singapore’s answer to Malaysia’s Jimmy Choo, the brothers Charles and Keith Wong design stylish, affordable women’s shoes and handbags too. Daily 10.30am–10pm.

Dakshaini Silks 13 Upper Dickson Rd, Little India 6291 9969; map. Indian embroidered silk textiles and clothes. Mon–Sat 10am–9pm, Sun 10am–8pm.

Rumah Bebe 113 East Coast Rd, Katong 6247 8781, rumahbebe.com; map. This delightful place sells beaded shoes and handbags, costume jewellery and the traditional garb – kebaya and sarong – of Nyonya women. They also offer courses in beading and Nyonya cookery. Tues–Sun 9.30am–6.30pm.

Toko Aljunied 91 Arab St 6294 6897; map. Quality batik cloth and kebaya – the blouse/sarong combinations traditionally worn by Nyonyas. Bespoke clothes too, by appointment. Mon–Sat 10.30am–7pm, Sun 11.30am–6pm.

Books

Singapore bookshops are reasonably stocked; all the larger ones carry a good selection of Western and local fiction and nonfiction titles, plus a range of magazines. Besides the stores listed here, there’s also the mail-order Select Books, with the best selection of specialist titles on Singapore, Malaysia and the rest of East Asia (selectbooks.com.sg).

Kinokuniya Level 3, Ngee Ann City 6339 1790, kinokuniya.com.sg; map. Singapore’s best general bookshop, with titles on every conceivable subject and some foreign-language literature too, plus loads of magazines. Daily 10am–9.30pm.

Littered With Books 20 Duxton Rd 6220 6824; map. Despite its name, this indie outlet has a neatly laid out, though somewhat random, selection of literary fiction, thrillers and travel writing. Hours can be irregular, sometimes open longer Fri–Sun. Daily at least noon–8pm.

Times Bookstore #04–05 Plaza Singapura 6336 8861, timesbookstores.com.sg; map. A well-stocked local chain. Daily 10am–10pm.

directory

Banks and exchange There’s no shortage of ATMs – practically every MRT station has one, as do all malls. Licensed moneychangers, offering slightly more favourable exchange rates than the banks, aren’t hard to find, particularly in Little India and on Orchard Rd.

Embassies and consulates The “missions” section of the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs website mfa.gov.sg carries a full list.

Emergencies See Basics.

Gyms Fitness First (fitnessfirst.com.sg) and Pure Fitness (purefitness.com/singapore) operate downtown gyms, though you will need to take out membership to use them.

Hospitals The state-run Singapore General Hospital, Outram Rd (SGH; 6222 3322; sgh.com.sg; Outram Park MRT), has a 24hr casualty/emergency department, as does the privately run Raffles Hospital, 585 North Bridge Rd (6311 1111, rafflesmedicalgroup.com).

Pharmacies Both Guardian and Watsons are ubiquitous downtown, with branches in shopping malls and even in a few MRT stations, though only the largest outlets handle prescriptions.

Phones For details of mobile phone providers, see Basics.

Police In an emergency, dial 999; otherwise call the police hotline 1800 225 0000.

Post offices The island has dozens of post offices (typically Mon–Fri 9am–5pm & Sat 9am–1pm), with the one in the basement of City Square Mall, near Farrer Park MRT and Little India, keeping slightly longer hours (Mon–Sat 10am–7pm). For more on the mail system, contact SingPost (1605, singpost.com).

Swimming Singapore has some of the world’s best state-run swimming facilities; just about every new town has a well-maintained 50m open-air pool, open from early morning until well into the evening. The best-located downtown pool is the Jalan Besar Swimming Complex on Tyrwhitt Rd, near Lavender and Farrer Park MRT station. Charges are a mere S$1.50 or so; have coins available for the ticket gates and lockers.

Travel agents Try the following for discounted airfares and packages: STA Travel, #B1-46 Singapore Management University Library, 70 Stamford Rd 6737 7188, statravel.com.sg; Chan Brothers, #07-01 Fook Hai Building, 150 South Bridge Rd 6212 9988, chanbrothers.com; and Zuji zuji.com.sg.

Vaccinations Tan Tock Seng Hospital, across the road from Novena MRT, has a Travellers’ Health & Vaccination Centre (Mon–Fri 8.30am–5pm; 6357 2222, ttsh.com.sg).

Women’s helpline AWARE 1800 774 5935, aware.org.sg.

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