A Hot Yoga Night’s Dream

I sailed through pillars of clouds and flashes of light regularly – sometimes every week or two, sometimes as long as a couple of months apart. The skies and seas between Bali and Singapore are like something out of a story – a place where Bugis pirates raided Chinese junks and Arab ships. Places of Hindu myth and lore. The stretch of sky between Bali and Singapore is like what the Mediterranean was to Odysseus – filled with mystery and monsters and tales. 

From the plane it's nothing but crazy clouds, lightning and islands – much of which are red with some farming, new construction, old villages or nothing at all. Then, just minutes before the flight ends, out of nowhere appears a city – clean, quiet and with tall modern buildings. Something that doesn't look at all as if it should exist there. Then you land.

Coming from the north, however, isn't really at all like that. The run between Thailand and Singapore is really quite boring – to be perfectly anticlimactic. Numerous flights a day across multiple airlines connect two of ASEAN's anchor countries and with the exception of occasional turbulence, it's a very routine route. So my travel to Singapore was itself ordinary with the exception of Thai Airways always being its very comfortable self with great food. 

But the part where you land in a city that is like nothing else in Southeast Asia – and in many ways the world – is the same. After an exceptionally easy time getting through the airport, going through immigration, getting my bags – as is typical in my favorite airport anywhere – I found myself in a clean, nice taxi cruising down the East Coast Parkway as I have innumerable times.

My mind went to what a beautiful job Singapore did of cultivating a tropical garden out of itself. Lee Kuan Yew called "Greening Singapore" one of the most important things the early Singaporean government did to attract foreign direct investment. While LKY's motivations were often more economic that civic pride and enjoyment motivated, the move was the right one no matter what. Singapore being attractive did have a role in bringing large corporations to Singapore and having talent from around the globe want to live and work here. Even without that, greening Singapore made it a place for Singaporeans to enjoy – an astounding piece of civic and ecological planning for what was once a dry, red sandbar like the islands you see from the plane. 

Then I played the mental game I played on Sukhumvit. What would it be like to see Singapore with fresh eyes? I'm so far from that now, so it's hard to remember – and then Singapore isn't quite the same one I encountered in 2004. I remember my first reaction was the constant question running in my head, "How does all of this exist? How did this happen?" Because it's not a very typical thing to find an British English speaking super-clean, high tech, modern first-world city-state island one degree north of the Equator in Southeast Asia inhabited by people of multiple ethnicities (Chinese, Malay and Tamil Indian) that don't seem like they would intersect at all.

I remember also hearing others' reactions.

"It's Disneyland!"

"This place is civilized!"

"I don't want them to read my DNA."

"What is this place?"

"WTF is going on here?!"

"Holy God it's humid!"

All of these are understandable first reactions.

At least for me – and others I have known – Singapore has a way of growing on you quickly. Or maybe lulling you into comfort is a better way to say it. Things are very modern. Everyone speaks English. Everything is in English. There are malls everywhere that feel like home – only nicer. You can find every food you might want – and try a ton you've never had before. It's safe. It's clean. It all works so easily. Once you figure out how to by an MRT pass, the world's your oyster and if you ever get lost – just flag a very affordably priced taxi which you're bound to find quickly. A nice English speaking driver will get you back to wherever you started or need to be in no time. So, aside from the weather – which is a shock to the system if you're not used to it – Singapore is like one of those scrambled posters from the early 90's where you can see the picture if you just relax your eyes and stop trying so hard to see it.

Many people like to compare Hong Kong and Singapore for obvious reasons – former British colonies, English speaking, Chinese ethnic majorities, economic success, small island states, port cities, hybrid East-West cultures, strong roles in the financial world and population density. Oh, and they used to use the same Toyota Crown taxis modeled on London taxis. I think the similarities are highly misleading. Fundamentally, they are two very different places with different things going on. The list could be much longer, but just a quick few: Singapore is a multi-ethnic society, an actual nation, provides for its defense and foreign policy, a very diversified economy, has underlying goals of social stability and through equality and most importantly, Singaporeans are in charge of their own destiny. 

Coming into the heart of the city where I'm staying on the 17th floor of the Peninsula Tower in the Peninsula Excelsior Hotel (one of my early haunts during my first visits to Singapore with great views), cranes spot the landscape. Singapore is always building, renovating and growing. During that first year visiting Singapore and all those stays at the Peninsula, I watched the National Library down the street go from ground zero to complete in one year with crews working in shifts around the clock.

Two new condo buildings are going up in the nearby Bugis area. As my taxi passed, I asked the elderly driver – because older taxi drivers usually know everything that matters – if the projects were new HDB blocks (government built) or private condos.

"Wah!" he replied with a look of disgust. To be clear, he spoke perfectly great English.

I took it as a "No, the greedy assholes are not building HDB blocks in this part of town."

In my defense, there are HDB blocks within range of there – but they are some of Singapore's oldest and I had read the government planned to renovate them to keep their quality and property values on par with other, newer HDB developments in other parts of Singapore. I had taken the liberty of thinking that perhaps there might even be some new HDB construction. But "Wah!" was concise and clear.

After settling into my hotel room, sorting out some laundry and doing a little writing, I decided to go to yoga. Singapore has no shortage of yoga studios – many of them with hot yoga. So I narrowed it down to the two closest and decided to go with the smaller one on Arab Street – one of my favorite neighborhoods. The studio wasn't quite what I envisioned – a little less cute, not quite the amenities advertised – but the class was solid.

Then something unexpected happened. When I came back out to the Singapore streets it was like my wish was granted and I could see Singapore with fresh eyes. Or at least different ones. It was probably just an unusually strong post-yoga high, but suddenly I could remember everything I loved about Singapore and after raiding the first 7-Eleven I came to for water, I walked to Bugis Junction – one of my favorite malls/streets/areas to look at dinner options. It all felt new, exciting and fun again. Bugis Junction took a real set of narrow shopping streets with their shophouse facades and essentially encased them in glass – making an air conditioned indoor mall of a traditionally outdoor space – and then they augmented a bit. It was one of the first spaces I loved in Singapore and I loved it again.

I also loved all the kinds of food, all the cultures and languages – and that I could understand about 60 percent of what people around me where saying, but they could understand me 100 percent of the time – because they all speak English, they just don't always do it with each other. I saw a restaurant called Eating House and another called Smile Dessert House that's a 24-hour dessertery. I forgot how much Singaporeans openly and shamelessly love their food – and I love their food too! For dinner, I had Singaporean popiah (different than Filipino, Indonesian or Thai popiah, and distinct from, but similar to Malaysian popiah) and some duck noodles.

I had also forgotten that people stay out at night – not crazy late, but they don't pack it in too early – often shopping or getting dinner out after work and school. It's often cheaper to eat dinner out at a Hawker Center or food court that it would be to cook, so families eating out or picking up dinner during the week is quite common.

Then I walked the outdoor market across the street and remembered both how hot it is, but also how I have always enjoyed its eclectic mix of bargain clothes, electronics, knock-offs, foods, juices and people wheeling through with boxes and suitcases for no comprehensible reason. I discovered Kaya Bites – kaya spread in little bite sized bubble pancakes. Why get an entire set of kaya toast when you can have Kaya Bites?! Brilliant!

After raiding two more stores for water – because I really needed it – I walked my way slowly and not too directly back to my hotel. I could remember when my friend Jesiah and I walked those streets on our first visit to Singapore – exploring this city that made no sense to us and that we found fascinating with every block. I remembered living in Singapore and the times of excitement and fun – and the times that were hard, sad and heavy. All the visitors, nights out, new friends, work, play, amazing conversations and moments of feeling lost, confused, sad – all of it flooded back along Victoria Street as I passed Chijmes (where Tony's wedding will be – and a place I love in general) and the Victoria Street Fire House (a beautiful relic from the British period) and it was all beautiful – all of it.

In the mix of the experience – the curiosity, exploration, friendships, loves, wins, losses, struggles, exaltations and depressions – I realized something about Singapore that makes it resonate so well for me. It's the calmest major metropolitan city I've ever seen. The middle of town at a busy hour still has wide walkable sidewalks one would hardly describe as bustling. They just allow people to get around. It's not crowded or rushed. There's no frenetic energy like in New York or Hong Kong. Nor are people sequestered in their cars like in Los Angeles. Singaporeans use the trains, buses (many of them double decker) and taxis – they're out there with each other. They're just civilized and share space well. the sidewalks are also huge in many places, which helps too. So in the humid night air in the middle of town, there's a peace bordering on a warm feeling. People aren't cold and hardened like in Paris or New York, but relaxed and sociable as they pass safely through the gentle urban night. 

Singapore is a city I can live with – and one time it was one I enjoyed living in. It's been so long since Singapore and I have had any time together – just the two of us. First there was Emily (who was lukewarm on Singapore) and then the kids who required a lot of attention in our already too brief layovers through the years. So I'm grateful for this time just the two of us again – and for whatever happened in hot yoga to open my heart and eyes to really see Singapore again. I am also grateful for the Kaya Balls – that was a real stroke of genius.

So I am back in a city that makes no sense and all the sense in the world at the same time – and I couldn't be happier about it. Namaste.