It is January 6th, 2024, the morning after our 4-hour bus ride from Malaysia to Singapore. Our day consisted of a business visit to Echevaria.co, lunch at Chinatown, and a cruise around Clarke Quay.
In the morning, my roommate and I woke up early and got dressed to eat from the complimentary buffet at Hotel Mercure. The buffet had an assortment of Western, Asian, and Indian food. My plate included bacon, naan and dhal curry, vegetable stir-fry noodles, chicken char siu pau, and har gow (prawn dumplings) and fish soup. I also had peaches, cantaloupe and melon on the side.
After breakfast, we took a 20-minute bus ride to our first business visit in Singapore, Echevaria.co, a sustainable botanical creative design studio founded by Huiyin in 2020. Huiyin’s background in Architectural design and sustainable efforts have proven to be quite successful for her and I believe that she will achieve great success as her business is unlike any I have seen or come across before. She also works with a small team but does not have much time for other things, such as applying for grants to subsidize the company or marketing through Tiktok. Huiyin showed great promise and passion for her work and I really commend Huiyin for all that she has done and achieved, especially since she is in charge of most of the operations.
In Chinatown, we also had a chance to venture inside the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum.
It was raining quite hard when we decided to head to the temple and my friend and I had to huddle under my umbrella. The staff member at the entrance had to verify whether or not we were appropriately dressed and provided garments to those that were not. The temple was very beautiful, calm, and quiet. We saw many individuals chanting verses to a few statues and others kneeling and praying in front of a Buddha statue.
The temple had three levels above ground which we went through. At the ground level, which is pictured above, we saw several offering tables. One could offer money or provide symbolic offerings with flowers, candles, and water. We also went out back to offer stick incense and were shown how to do so. The fourth level of the temple was dedicated to the relic chamber, which had gold floor tiles. Upon entering, all shoes and bags had to be removed and placed in a designated area.
For the last activity of the day, we ended up in Marina Bay Sands and went on a cruise around Clarke Quay. The cruise lasted about 40 minutes and it was very lovely to see the buildings that surround Clarke Quay such as the Singapore Flyer, the Marina Bay, and the Central Business District.
We came across a few statues on our cruise, such as the one pictured above, in the middle, known as the Bronze Kids Jumping into the Singapore River, which symbolizes the earlier days of Singapore and how the youth would jump into the water for fun. We also saw the Merlion Fountain and the statue of Sir Stamford Raffles. The merlion is a mythical creature that has the body of a fish and the head of a lion. The merlion is the mascot of Singapore, which is also called the Lion City. Sir Stamford Raffles is commemorated as the founder of modern Singapore and several buildings are named in his honor like the Raffles Hospital. After the cruise, we had a chance to walk around and my friends and I decided to get ice-cream and browsed through the stores at Clarke Quay.
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