Ryan ’25, shares an action packed day, that started with Chinese language lessons and ended with an evening light show and a stroll through the Fort Canning Park.
Today was definitely my favorite day of the trip so far. We first started off with another delicious breakfast at the YWCA and left right after to go to our lesson with CIEE. It felt like we took a trip down memory lane back to when we first started learning Chinese as we learned how to introduce ourselves doing an activity that allowed us to learn more about each other. After the two-hour lesson, we were ready for a break, but that would have to wait until after an amazing presentation by the lovely people from the Tanoto Foundation about what their organization is all about. It was awesome being able to interact and have conversations with these great people. We continued these conversations as they took us all out to lunch where we had incredible Indian food and played a few games of pool.
Once our bus finally arrived to pick us up from lunch, we were all eager to start the day’s activities. Led by our outstanding tour guide David, we made it to the Gardens by the Bay, which were a spectacular sight to see. The two domes, the Flower Dome and the Cloud Forest, both had incredible views from inside, but my favorite was definitely the cloud forest, specifically the catwalk type pathway that allowed you to see the beautiful waterfall and all of the other plants from the highest point of the dome.
After the visit to Gardens by the Bay, we went straight to the Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre where we would be for the next hour and a half. We were able to walk through the exhibit quite a few times, which was actually nice because we could really soak up all of the information available. There were a lot of interactive activities that were a lot of fun.
We then waited for our bus to arrive to take us to dinner where we tried chicken rice, a famous dish that we had heard lots about. It was quite good and fun to try. From dinner we decided that we couldn’t get enough of the area we were in earlier in the day, the Gardens by the Bay, and the Marina Bay Sands, so we went back and walked around for a while and saw the amazing sunset over the gorgeous city skyline. We walked around the big shopping mall with a lot of very fancy shops inside and fascinating architecture, and at 8:00 pm we headed back to the water where we saw an amazing light show with music to go along with it. That was my favorite part of the day by far! After the light show, a group of students including myself went back to the gardens to see them lit up at night, while another group of students cleverly made their way up to the tip top of the Marina Bay Sands hotel and saw the incredible view from the top.
But the day wasn’t over just yet. After getting back to the hotel, I and a few other classmates walked across the street to walk around the Fort Canning park which was really cool to see. I am so excited for the rest of the trip and looking forward to what tomorrow has to offer!
