One
of the most entertaining (and inexpensive) ways for me to spend my Saturday
weekend is to wander along the streets of Singapore with my camera in hand.
I
have overdone my enthusiasm on last Saturday and went ahead to sign up for 2 walks with my recently ‘fresh
from exams’ daughter. Both walks are organised
by Preservation of Monuments Board (www.pmb.sg).
I have done some of their walks in the
past like “Accidental
Tourist - March 2012 Walking Tour "Stained Glass Stories",
February Accidental
Tourist - February 2012 Walking Tour "A Debt to History" Each ordinary walk
costs S$5 for adults and S$3 for children. For the bus tour, it costs S$5 per person. In urban Singapore, this is sure an inexpensive way to spend 1.5-2 hours of your time :) You may get a bit of a tan after the walk but it’s definitely better than just spending the day at the mall for the kids as they get a chance to experience and hear about the history of Singapore through trained guides.
The 1st
walk was a new one which features special commissioned tracks by local
musicians which composed music to reflect their appreciation of the monuments -
Musicity Singapore: “Music at the Monuments” covered 3 of the 7 locations
namely, Hong San See Temple, Asian Civilisations Museum former Empress Place
Building and Singapore Art Museum former St. Joseph’s Institution.
Unlike other
walks, we had the privilege of taking a shuttle bus between locations (which
was a welcome relief when faced with the blazing tropical sun of Singapore).
Using QR scan code that can be downloaded from the panels, you can listen to
the specially composed music while getting a running commentary from the volunteer
guides at each location.
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| Musicity Singapore: “Music at the Monuments” |
After some lunch & down time, we went to our 2nd walk in the afternoon called the ‘Mixed Blessings’ walk that covered Thian Hock Keng Temple, Al-Abrar Mosque and Telok Ayer Chinese Methodist Church all nicely spaced out along Telok Ayer Street.
What pleased me most about taking my daughter along for the walks was that she actually remembered nuggets of information like which door to go into and out of a Chinese temple and why. To me, exposing my child to the multi-faceted side of Singapore is my way of connecting them to the country and hopefully they will be able to appreciate the rich diversity and mix of cultures that we have as well as cultivate a sense of sensitivity to different religions and cultures.
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| ‘Mixed Blessings’ walk by Preservation of Monuments Board |
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