Stay central and treat the island as one city. Marina Bay is the postcard: the waterfront loop, Gardens by the Bay, the skyline from the Merlion. The heritage quarters, a few MRT stops apart, are why you stay longer: a morning each for Chinatown, Little India and Kampong Glam, eating at hawker centres. Head east to Katong and Joo Chiat for Peranakan shophouses and laksa, give half a day to the Botanic Gardens, and add Sentosa with children. With a spare morning, take the bumboat to Pulau Ubin.
1 Singapore city guide
Fun fact
Singapore has grown by roughly a quarter since independence through land reclamation, and is still expanding.
Stereotypes, sorted out
The realityIt was, when the airport was the point and the city was a night between flights. Three days is the honest minimum now: a day for the bay, a day for the quarters, a day for the east coast or the reserves. The food alone fills the time, and the queue outside the good stalls is the proof.
The realityOrchard Road earns that description and almost nothing else does. Kampong Glam, Little India, Chinatown, Tiong Bahru, Geylang Serai and Katong are shophouse quarters with their own noise and smell, hawker centres are the loudest rooms in the country, and Pulau Ubin is a bumboat ride from all of it.
The realityThe hotels and the drinks are the expensive part. Eat where residents eat and a full meal costs less than a coffee in most European capitals, and the MRT crosses the island for pocket change. The city is expensive to live in and cheap to eat in, a useful combination for a visitor.
The realityChewing it is not. Importing and selling it has been banned since 1992, after gum jammed the doors on MRT trains, and pharmacists have been allowed to supply dental and therapeutic gum since the mid-2000s. The rule everyone repeats is a trade restriction, not a personal one.
The realityThe skyline is. The Botanic Gardens have been running since 1859 and were listed by UNESCO in 2015, the shophouse quarters are nineteenth and early twentieth century, and the temples, mosques and churches between them predate every tower on the waterfront.
How to fit in
- Choping is real: a packet of tissues left on a hawker centre table reserves it, and the seat is taken even though it looks empty.
- Clear your own table. Tray return at hawker centres and food courts stopped being a suggestion in 2021.
- Queue, and do not treat the queue as negotiable. It is the closest thing the country has to a national sport.
- Cover shoulders and knees at temples and mosques, and take your shoes off where the sign or the pile of shoes says so.
- Eating and drinking on the MRT is fined, and durian is banned outright, sign and all.
- English carries every conversation. Enjoy Singlish, and leave speaking it to the locals.
- Ask before photographing people at work in a hawker stall or a market, and do not block the queue to do it.
Famous Singaporean faces
Lee Kuan Yew
Joseph Schooling
Stefanie Sun
Lawrence Wong
Tharman Shanmugaratnam
Halimah Yacob
Loh Kean Yew
Yip Pin Xiu
Fandi Ahmad
Anthony Chen
Fann Wong
Kevin Kwan
JJ Lin
Dick Lee
Sonny Liew
Catherine Lim
Chan Hon Meng
Violet Oon
Must-try Singaporean food
Hainanese chicken rice
Poached chicken on rice cooked in its stock, with chilli and ginger. The national debate.
Chilli crab
Mud crab in a sweet, savoury chilli gravy, invented here in the 1950s. Mop it with mantou.
Black pepper crab
The drier, hotter rival: crab wok-tossed in butter and cracked black pepper.
Hokkien mee
Yellow noodles and vermicelli braised in prawn stock, with lime and sambal.
Bak chor mee
Minced pork noodles with vinegar and chilli. A Hill Street stall holds a Michelin star.
Chai tow kway
Fried radish cake with egg and preserved radish. White is savoury, black has sweet soy.
Nasi lemak
Coconut rice with anchovies, peanuts, egg and sambal, wrapped in banana leaf.
Laksa
Rice noodles in coconut and prawn gravy with cockles. Katong cuts them short for a spoon.
Char kway teow
Flat rice noodles fried hard with egg, cockles, sweet soy and lard. Smoke is the point.
Bak kut teh
Pork ribs in peppery garlic broth, eaten at breakfast with dough sticks and tea.
Satay
Charcoal skewers with peanut sauce, cucumber and rice cakes, by the dozen after dark.
Fish head curry
Snapper head in tamarind curry, created here in 1949 by a Kerala-born cook.
Rojak
Fruit, fritters and cucumber in prawn paste, sugar and lime. Sweet, sour and pungent.
Roti prata
Thrown, folded, griddled dough with fish or mutton curry. Plain, egg or cheese, any hour.
Kaya toast
Charcoal toast with coconut jam and cold butter, with soft-boiled eggs and dark soy.
Chendol
Shaved ice over coconut milk, palm sugar and pandan jelly. The mid-afternoon fix.
Ice kacang
Shaved ice over red beans, sweetcorn and jelly, with syrup and evaporated milk.
Kopi
Sock-brewed coffee ordered in code: kopi-o is black, kopi-c has evaporated milk.
Teh tarik
Tea pulled between jugs until it foams, sweet with condensed milk.
