Today the plan is to get some breakfast, then redeem the zoo ticket I booked yesterday and then blow my load on a fancy buffet. I always like to have 1 fancy meal on my holidays, since the rest of the meals are usually street food or cheap local restaurants. But just because I’m on holiday doesn’t mean my dislike for fine dining goes away, plus I only have a budget of $100 and I doubt Singaporean fine dining is that much cheaper than Sydney, so $100 is probably not enough. Instead I figured the best value for me is to go for a fancy buffet with seafood :D, more on that later.
Before I think about dinner, gotta take care of breakfast too. I usually don’t eat breakfast so I can have that extra sleep in time in the morning, also ceebs making breakfast, also ceebs extra carbs. I’ve heard of a famous hawker centre near Chinatown called Maxwell, which has apparently the best Hainanese chicken & rice ever, and it’s only less than 10 minute walk away. Unfortunately, when I got there the Hainanese chicken store is yet to open, the owner there is busy prepping the shop for a busy lunch. Not many stalls are open for breakfast it seems, there was a congee shop that I remember reading about being quite good, but tbh I’m not a fan of congee.
There’s also a self serving section with a bunch of Asian staples like fried rice and chow mein, but that seems too pleb to come all the way here to eat. While that doesn’t leave me with much choice (a lot of the open stalls are drink stalls), I did find this fish ball noodle place that turned out to be pretty good! And as usual, ridiculously cheap, along with some sugar cane juice.
The fish balls weren’t like super ultra amazing or anything, it’s one of those things with a low ceiling, i.e. at some point it can’t really get any better. The noodles were tangy and had a nice chili flavour, so when you mix it all up together it was pretty damn good for a meal under $5. I will definitely be back to try out the Hainanese chicken however.
Back at the hostel, a super friendly staff tells me the ticket only comes at 10 am, not 8-9 as I was told last night, so I have about 1 hour to chill, should’ve slept in longer -.-. In the mean time, I had a chat with the staff on how much time to spend at the zoo. She says 2 hours is enough but she likes nature and takes forever with photos (like waiting for the animals to get up or turn their head around) so for her it’s 4-5 hours. I’m no photo nut, but I can’t imagine only spending 2 hours at a really good zoo…
Some Euro girl next to me is also going to the zoo, but she seemed really quiet. The staff girl was like oh you guys could go together and she just kinda ignored her. Well fk u too LOL. Honestly though, zoo is probably one activity I’d rather just do alone, since I don’t want anyone to be waiting on me while I’m fixated on some animal.
It took me 3 trains and a bus to finally get there, but the entire trip was like under $2. A trip from my place to Taronga zoo in Sydney guaranteed to be $10+ in peak hour with the scamferry.
It’s about 11:30 when I got my tickets redeemed. Given I’m having a buffet at 6:30 pm, I didn’t wanna risk getting suuuuper hungry around 3-4 pm and having a snack, so I figured I might as well fill up right now for lunch and then go hungry till 6:30. Also because there’s a KFC here and I must try KFC every country I go to.
You know a society is doing right when fast food is NOT the cheapest thing the average person can get their hands on. Seriously if shit like Maccas or Dominos wasn’t that cheap in Australia (ok they aren’t that cheap anymore but still cheaper than most things, although a lot of fancier pizza chains are creeping up), everyone won’t be so bloody fat. Yeh sure noodles with fish ball isn’t the MOST healthy thing but if I had a choice of $3 for Hainanese chicken & rice or ~$8 I paid for this medium zinger burger meal, I’d be so healthy. /end rant
Anyway, the zinger patty was pretty good, still behind Sydney but good nonetheless. Chips were pretty crap however, I can forgive them for not having chicken salt but they didn’t even add much salt on there, tasted pretty bland. Still better than trash KFC in America.
And omg, they have KFC breakfast here, that Zinger platter looks soooo goood fk me thank god they don’t have it in Sydney or I’d be so fat.(ter)
Okay time for the zoo, I don’t have the ceebs to write about all the animals here, probably boring too, so I’m gonna go through these pretty quickly.
So right at the gates there’s a vote counter letting visitors choose which animal they should try save next (kinda like how grill’d does that charity thing with the bottle caps). Clearly orangutan isn’t getting much love compared to the cuter animals, so I voted for the underdog.
Actually not even close lol rip orangutans.
This exhibit right outside the entrance isn’t fenced or anything, literally a tree with monkeys on it and a info sign + a warning sign not to feed/touch. Pretty cool, I like zoos that give so much freedom to the animals.
Okay, because this is right next to the monkeys, I don’t actually know if these generic brown squirrels are actually zoo exhibit or just wild scavengers.
I’m sure there’s a perfectly good reason for this things name, but lul. It’s also massive, like HUGE.
Saw this little bug next to the wooden railing, even bugs here are different, never seen this before.
Weird looking horse/donkey/elephant hybrid things, with a funny fairy tale backstory. Kinda like reverse ugly duckling?
4 tusk pig
Okay forgot the name of this thing, but some kind of pig/boar that has 2 sets of tusks instead of 1, see the extra set on its nose? Never seen this before. Being a frequent zoo visitor, it’s always nice to see species I’ve never seen before.
PotM’s mount
So even though the sign says these are pygmy hippos, these are bloody big. Apparently they are too fat to actually swim so they just bounce along the river bed, pretty funny when they do it.
long necked turtle
So even though the sign says these are pygmy hippos, these are bloody big. Apparently they are too fat to actually swim so they just bounce along the river bed, pretty funny when they do it. Also, if you zoom in on the first picture, you can see tonnes of fish just eating shit off the hippo while it chills, like a buffet.
Wild boar with weird facial hair
Lots and lots of monkeys fighting or scratching each other, or just judging at the hoomans watching them. Above there’s a herd of ibex, which are like mountaineering deers with long curvy horns.
Some kind of capybara lookalikes
There’s an Australian section which I skimmed through, most interesting thing was tree kangaroos but hard to get a photo off. Sponsored by these scrubs, fking rejected my credit card application for no good reason (I may have however, wrote my occupation was a baker)
Side note, I’ve actually seen both CBA and ANZ ATMs here, so that might be a useful info for people out there, but remember their travel cards are a ripoff. Citibank ftw.
Made it in time for a elephant show, there’s a strong focus on conservation here and educating people on endangered animals, well more than other zoos. Apparently elephants need to have an experienced mother to help them through a pregnancy, kinda like a midwife, otherwise they get too traumatised and may reject the baby…so these are all rescued orphans. The right picture, this elephant is repeatedly thrusting it’s big trunk into a hole in the wood, seemingly just for fun (like it didn’t bring out any food or anything)…I mean I didn’t want to say anything but a Chinese couple beside me basically yelled it out lul.
focus on the camera phone isn’t great 😦
Saw this while walking, can’t focus well but it was a funky looking caterpillar. I was bent over staring at it and a group of 3 chicks were walking towards my direction and I think they thought I was like intensely observing them LOL. Had to make like an overt gesture with my camera so they know I’m not actually perving on them.
There’s feeding time displayed on a info brochure you get when you come in, unfortunately I sat down for some aircon in a food court and the cleaner thought it was rubbish 😦 Luckily I got in at the right time for feeding in the Arctic section. The trainer for the sea lion was making it do tricks before giving it some fish. She decided to be a troll and waited for a crowd to gather, before commanding the sea lion to jump in to the pool, then flap it’s flippers to splash water on us -_- wasn’t actually bad because it cooled me down, and got some kids to start crying 😀
cute raccoons with a fur coat
Free roaming for orangutans, dem arm strength to be able to suspend from those wires with just one hand :O
I went around the African section twice due to the layout of the zoo, first time not much interesting as most of them just sitting around not doing much
These African painted dogs are pretty cool though, imagine big doggos with patterns. They are also fast eaters…
Didn’t get to see the lions, but damn respect is earned for that stamina
Meercats on the watch, some were running around as if doing patrols
These weird things are naked mole rats, and they live like ants, e.g. in a colony underground where majority are worker rats and there’s 1 queen, didn’t know that structure existed outside insects. They are also apparently immortal and impervious to pain…
There’s a jungle section which is like a big dome you can walk around in, and animals roam around you. These monkeys are totally not afraid of people and will sit there with you :D. Also these squirrels look like they actually belong in a zoo lol.
Selection of creepy crawlies, usually don’t have much problem with insects but fuck those giant cockroaches.
Bumped into another free event! This time got my pictures taken with an orangutan and her baby.
Next is the reptile section, caught some animals in some uhh compromising positions with the female keeps trying to run away 😦
Feeding time for chameleons, their tongue flings out way too fast to suck in the poor crickets for my camera to capture.
When I made my way back to the African section, more of them were up and about. Also caught the feeding time for African painted doggos, they were sleeping before and one actually woke up and then woke up its buddies to let them know it’s food o’clock.
And that’s the end of the zoo. Probably the best zoo I’ve been to! Highly recommend you check it out if animals are your thing. They also have a river safari, bird park and a night safari, which I still haven’t decided if I want to check any of them out.
It was 4:30 by the time I finished, so that’s 4.5 hours without even spending too much time at any one particular exhibit! 2 hours my ass lol.
Now it’s time for the main course. Singapore has many fancy hotels that have a seafood buffet, but a lot of them actually run over $100. Plus the prices they quote online are often like this – “SGD 100 ++” so you think it’s $100 but the “++” actually means another 17% worth of service charge and GST, ggwp scammed. I chose the Carousel buffet at the Royal Plaza on Scott (street), which comes down to $90 with a 10% discount for Citibank users (another reason to get their card!), mainly because it’s relatively cheap but still had lobsters! It’s also highly rated and halal certified, if you care about that kind of stuff.
One look and this is definitely not the type of places I can afford lul. Inside the buffet, they have many stations: seafood, sushi, teppanyaki, thai (they were doing a Thai promotion), Western food, carving station, Chinese food, Indian food, pasta station and desserts and ice cream. Obviously, I went straight for the seafood, which had clams, oysters, scallops, mussels, prawns, crab claws and lobsters!
So here’s my haul: 7 plates of food, 1 bowl of pasta in chilli garlic oil, 1 plate of desserts and then ice cream.
Given how much lobster and oyster I ate, I’d say I made my $90 back. Had a bite of everything else but they weren’t anything super amazing, and a lot of them like Chinese food you can find on the streets for cheaper. Some other highlights were the Thai soft shell crabs, duck curry and the pasta – don’t worry I didn’t have any pasta until I was done with everything else, just had a small bowl at the end to fill up the rest of my stomache (before desserts). It was cool watching them cook the pasta for you on the spot too, and the chef was very friendly and had a conversation with me while he cooked.
The teppanyaki section was pretty disappointing, the chicken and tuna was fried to the point of dryness. I picked up a thing from a random unlabeled bowl next to the chicken and it turned out to be cabbage, yuck. Sushi was also skipped since nothing looked amazing, just stick to the sashimi, the fish roe was good though.
I’m usually not a dessert eater since I can’t afford it after paying for a meal, but now I can :D. First time having chocolate fondue, looks cool but taste-wise meh. They had some wtf ice cream flavours though, like tom yum???
There was also a big family celebrating some teenagers birthday here, must be pretty rich to pay for 10+ people at $90 each. The entire staff even got around to sing and dance for him, but I could tell the chefs were just like fuck this why is this part of my job.
Anyway, the buffet runs from 6:30 to 10, and I came at the start and stayed till 9:30, long before some people who came after me have finished eating. I think I paced myself well, as I was still about 90% full when I finished, so if I really want to I could down another lobster and some oysters. However, knowing I have to make my way back to the hostel I decided tonight isn’t the night I die from food coma. Was this place worth it? If you can eat, and you love seafood, then I think it’s not bad. I see some people load up on the other random stuff which would definitely not be worth it.
So that’s probably the biggest meal I’m having in a while. Was very satisfied but probably won’t do it again. Not sure why or even how to explain it but I get more satisfaction when I find cheap and good street food, so whenever I fork out big $$$ (ok not even that big) a part of me can’t ignore the fact that I can spend a fraction of that and still be gloriously fed.
I drag my fat ass back to the hostel and watch some friends with the rest of the backpackers (and lots of bears). This is the episode where Phoebe and Rachel goes to reading club or something.
Poor Man's Backpack 