Emily ’24, reflects on a culturally enriching day in Singapore.
We started our day off at the CIEE office where we started class at 9:00am. Today was learned about a famous song and went through each verse to break down and understand the lyrics. We had the opportunity to watch videos of and listen to Stand up for Singapore and learn about its history and the significance of it. After our lesson, we were given time to write our family postcards in Chinese about what we have seen and done so far in the trip to practice our writing, which we would later mail out at the post office.
At 11:30am, our class ended and we headed to Korean BBQ for lunch. While we waited for the bus, we played several rounds of ‘Ninja’ and ‘Hot Hands’ to keep us busy. Afterwards, we visited a local shopping center to drop our postcards off at the post office and visit two bookstores and the Singapore National Library. At the libraries we got to look at a variety of books both in Chinese and English and read children’s picture books, non fiction books, novels, and recipe books.
After the library and book stores, we went to the Raffles Hotel to look at the beautiful architecture and venture into the multiple shops.
We then had free time, so a group of us headed to the Bugis Street markets to try new foods and drinks and look at all of the clothes and other souvenirs.
On our walk back through the park, we stopped at the national museum to take a look at the exhibits and learn about more of the history.
Once we were back at the hotel, we, yet again, got on the bus and drove to the beautiful home of the Devitre family to have an amazing meal of the famous Singapore chicken and rice, and have the opportunity to meet Deerfield alumni from a wide range of backgrounds. It was great to talk to them about their time at Deerfield, discuss the culture of Singapore, and even practice our Chinese.
Overall, today was a spectacular day and I can’t wait to see what the rest of the trip has in store.
