I am thinking about accompanying my husband on a business trip next month. His trip is in Singapore so we are based there Monday-Friday. Sat morning we leave for Hong Kong and have a half day there. We depart home on Sunday afternoon.

I have not visited these areas before and have no idea what there is to see and do. Also I am not sure if it is safe for me to wander around Singapore on my own.

Any ideas and comments are greatly appreciated! I need to make my decision regarding going this evening and don't want to miss an opportunity!

Heavens! I cannot think of a safer place to wander around than Singapore! I'm sure it's safer than wherever you live - it's safer than where I live and I live in Seattle. So if safety concern is all that is holding you back - do go. Singapore is sometimes referred to as "Asia lite" in the sense that it is clean, modern, and high tech so it's an easy introduction to Asia.

There is lots to do in Sngapore I love the museum of Asian Civilization, the Orchid Garden at the Botanical Gardens, wandering Raffles Hotel, etc. The Night Safari at the zoo typically gets rave reviews, and I enjoyed the Jurong Bird Park.

The food in Singapore is fabulous, and there are many wonderful hotels to choose from. Transport is easy - the MRT is clean, efficient, cheap. And if you are going somewhere away from the MRT, taxis are inexpensive and readily available. By the way, the Singapore Tourist board has the best publications of any tourist board in the world. Order their free materials (just google to find it)

Hong Kong has lots to offer, but it sounds like you'll have only a short time to sample it. You'll find teh crush of people there more overwhelming, but it's a fascinating city.

Good Lord...I can't think of a safer place than Singapore. I've been vacationing there almost annually for nearly a decade and I travel alone. I've stayed in Singapore as long as a week and a half and wondered around just about everywhere with no problems.Of course never let your guards totally down no matter where you travel to, but Singapore is quite safe. Happy Travels!

Thanks for the input. I have decided to accompany him. His company has booked accommodation at Pan Pacific in Singapore for our stay. It is supposed to be in a good location. I'm sure I'll be able to keep busy while he is working. I've heard there is great shopping in Singapore. But what do you buy?

Also we are able to leave for Hong Kong on Friday night, so now we have a full day there as opposed to a half day. I am thinking about staying in Kowloon. But again don't know anything about HK or where to stay. Hopefully we'll get a little taste of HK in a short time. I would like to see the Giant Budha, but not sure how long that takes or if it is a good use of time when we only have a day!

Pick up a copy of the book Treasures and Pleasures of Singapore which is an excellent book geared toward shopping along with the sites. I'm sure you can get it on Amazon. Happy Travels!

I go to Singapore by myself a couple of times a year - it is sooo safe. The Pan Pacific is a great hotel. If you exit on the 2nd floor there is a building right next door with a hawkers market type eatery that is fantastic.

You'll love the elevators in the Pan.

The shopping in Singapore is no longer inexpensive with the continually sinking dollar. So look around, you may find something you are interested in. But don't expect cheap electronics (haven't been cheaper than the US for at least a decade) or designer goods. I always look for the kinds of things you don't find in the US, Asian arts and crafts, Asian antiques. etc. Also, I often bring home spices such as curry blends that are not to be found in the US

I wouldn't call The Big Buddha at the Po Lin Monastery in Hong Kong a must see like the Pyramids or Great Wall, but if you're interested, it's quite worth going.

From Kowloon, it'll take about 35 minutes on the MTR to Tung Chung, and then about 45 minutes by bus to Ngong Ping. [The NP360 Skyrail cable car won't reopen by next month.] Add about 1.5 hour to walk around, it'll take you basically half a day minimum. You may want to have vegetarian lunch at the monastery as well.

You can stay in Kowloon, you can stay on Hong Kong Island. Really doesn't matter as transportation is easy, and there are sights on both sides of the harbour. I'll take the best hotel you can get for your budget on that day. Kowloon or Hong Kong side.

Glad you decided to go. Agree with above poster, surely no place is perfectly safe but with their "no chewing gum" and other rules, Singapore takes laws and safety to new levels.

Second Kathie's recommendations - the botanical gardens (easy taxi ride from downtown) and the night safari are excellant. Night markets are interesting and a great chance to try new foods. Also, while Raffels is famous for its bar and drinks, we also like having cocktails at the Fullerton.

Shopping - depends on where you live now. We did find some interesting boutiques/designers that we have never seen before - lots of use of linen and nice cottons for those of us in warmer climates.

Enjoy your trip!

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I'm going to the book store tomorrow to purchase a guide so that I can prepare. I think Kathie has given me enough suggestions for the week I am alone in Singapore. I really like the idea of the Night Safari and botanical gardens.

I'm not a big shopper, but will enjoy wandering through markets to browse at things I normally don't see.

But how are designer items priced in Asia compared to the US? I'm sure they are just as expensive!

Regarding HK, and giant buddha, sounds like its going to consume too much time considering I only have 1 day in HK. I'll have to research some suggestions for a day in HK. What side of the harbor has better sites - Kowloon or Hong Kong Island? I am thinking of spluring and staying at the Penninsula Hong Kong.

When you get to Singapore airport, pick up the FABULOUS walking guides free. They do one for orchard road, China town and little India. I found them super helpful and i was on my own too.
enjoy Singapore its a fantastic place.

I second the recco on the Asian Civilizations Museums (there are two branches) always has something interesting, take a look at http://www.acm.org.sg/home/home.asp to see what will be on when you are there. The National Museum of Singapore is worth a stop too. There is a loop walk in downtown Singapore of the colonial core that will give you a nice chance to see the colonial architecture and learn some history, and will include the Empress Place wing of the Asian Civilizations Museum. Most guidebooks describe it, also take a look at the website for the Singapore Tourist Authority at www.visitsingapore.com to see if they have info, and hopefully a map. A good street map will really help. Singapore is mostly flat (at least the main tourist bits) and the parts you want to see as a tourist are in the downtown rive and waterfront area and are really quite close together, perhaps a 3-4 mile square area (actually your hotel is kind of at the edge of the square). If taken slowly in the heat and with a map, all of this is walkable IMO. Taxis are cheap and there is an excellent subway system to get to a place like Orchard Road for shopping and restaurants if you don’t walk to walk the mile or so between the downtown river area and the Orchard Road area.

I just love walking the neighborhoods of Little India (Serangoon Road and that area) and Arab street with the narrow streets and traditional 2-storey shophouse buildings with the little family stores and restaurants; that is the Singapore I like the best. You can also still find this in “china town” -- hard to believe that there is one in a place so overwhelmingly Chinese -- over in the South Bridge Road area where there is an interesting Hindu temple (there are also a few in Little India too, naturally) and Chinese clan association buildings. You could almost pick an ethnic group a day and spend a few hours exploring each area. Little India has some excellent extremely casual restaurants, in particular Apollo Banana Leaf Curry (78 Race Course Road, Tel: 6293-8682). There are also casual street-side restaurants in the Arab Street area. The level of hygiene in Singapore is excellent, and all food, even street food, is quite safe and I would not have any concerns about hygiene in restaurants, ice, fruit, etc there. You can drink water from the tap, too. (You can in Hong Kong as well, local superstitions aside about some older pipes.)

During the wandering, great things to pick up would be glass and metal bangles at the shops in Little India (and things like saris, Punjabi suits and even bidis if you want to be really funky) and incense (including Oudh) and perfume oils in the Arab Street area. You can actually have your own perfume made in Arab Street or along North Bridge Road, you have the time so you might want to consider this.

Another good area for a quick stroll is Goodwood Park, just behind the Goodwood Park hotel on Scotts Road just a block up from the intersection with Orchard Road. This is a circular street of "black and white" bungalows (so called for their black and white shades or awnings) left over from the British times, and it is fun to walk around and see how the Raj once lived and how some very lucky (mostly expats) live today in colonial splendor. You can see one that was recently for rent in the neighborhood at http://www.citiprop.com/cms.www/prop...amp;prop=1090; pretty nice at about US$18,000 a month… There is a private club there at 2 Goodwill Hill Road call the Pryamid Club, but it is mostly deserted during the day and you can nose around there to get a look at what a bungalow looks like. More black and whites can be found on Nassim Road as well as around the area of the Shangri-La hotel.

Singapore has an excellent symphony orchestra (the SSO) which performs in a very modern, almost futuristic venue on the waterfront esplanade not too far from your hotel. They often have guest conductors, musicians or orchestras. Tickets are ridiculously cheap by US standards, take a look at http://www.esplanade.com to see if anything is on while you are there.

If one of your husband’s colleagues belongs to the Cricket Club, by all means get yourself invited there for lunch or dinner. Have a Gin Sling, which is the club’s version of the Singapore Sling (and some people believe it is actually the origin of the drink). The club just exudes the colonial era feeling, and has a nice location in downtown Singapore looking out onto the Padang where (naturally) cricket is played. Lunch on the outdoor terrace overlooking the Padang is especially nice, and get the Mulagatawny soup.

Singapore does have some beaches, especially the very pretty one along East Coast Park, a public park with biking, roller blading, windsurfing, etc. You can rent bikes here and ride along on bike paths or just walk. The water clarity is not good, and you can see all the tankers and other huge ships out in the roads (and can sail around them) which is very different. There are also some beaches out northwest of Changi Airport in the Pasir Ris area which also has good bike paths. I would not call any of the beaches in Singapore especially beautiful and would not go to Singapore for the beaches, but they do make a nice afternoon of walking, biking or sailing. The website for national parks in Singapore is http://www.nparks.gov.sg, it gives info on East Coast Park, Pasir Ris Park and all the other parks.

I have not shopped for souvenirs and handicrafts in Singapore in a while, but I believe that the Holland Village area is still good for this, and is an interesting area of shops and some good restaurants. The area is off the main tourist track much more than Orchard Road (but very popular with expatriates) and it’s a short taxi ride. I have always liked a shop called Lim’s Antiques (211 Holland Avenue, #02-01), a nice collection of stuff, some antiques but a lot of new and reproductions. There is even a place in Holland Village to take cooking lessons, you might enjoy this. Take a look at http://www.shermay.com. I have not done this, but know people who have done various courses and enjoyed it a lot.

The shops in the Raffles Hotel mall are rather upscale and have a nice selection of goods, the Raffles Hotel shop itself has some interesting items, and some historical type goods related to the hotel. The Asian Civilizations museum gift shops are a good place to look for local items as well.

Singapore is a great place to buy rugs, even better prices than Hong Kong. However, please do a good bit of looking around in the US before your trip so you have an idea of quality and price, or otherwise you won’t be able to make good comparison and bargains. Arab Street has a number of rug sellers, and theer are also shops in the malls and places like Holland Village. Arab Street is good IMO for small things like prayer rugs, rugs made into pillows, saddle bag pillows, etc. These are not too expensive and are packable into your luggage. For larger and really good quality rugs, you may want to go elsewhere. Rug auctions are a really great place to buy rugs as you can often find excellent prices. These are held at local hotels on weekday mornings or sometimes weeknighs and Sunday afternoons, check the local paper. (I know that Hedger’s Carpets, I shop I recently bought a rug from at an auction, participates in auctions at the Grand Hyatt twice a month, you might call the Grand Hyatt to find out dates.)

Another nice local item to buy is pewter, made in Malaysia, a chain of shops called Royal Selangor has a nice selection (http://www.royalselangor.com)

Finally, I think the clothes shopping in Singapore for women’s casual clothing is far superior to Hong Kong; Hong Kong is either very high end or very cheap stuff, there is nothing in between I find. (All the labels you see in the US say “made in Hong Kong”, but damned if I can find it here..) I love a chain of stores called British India, wish they would open one here. They have outlets in Raffles Shopping Centre and Millennia Walk Mall (both close to your hotel and attached by pedestrian walkways as far as I recall), Ngee Ann City Mall and Tanglin Shopping Centre. The Millennia Walk shop has some housewares too. There is sales tax in Singapore, but you can get this refunded for most items; be sure to ask about this and get the proper forms; there is a place downtown where you can get the refunds, you don’t have to lug all the stuff to the airport when you are leaving to do the refund process. (There is no sales tax in Hong Kong.)

As mentioned above, Singapore and Hong Kong are extremely safe, much safer than most any city of a similar size in the US or Europe. Violent crime is virtually unknown and petty crimes like pickpockets are rare. However, neither is Utopia…use common sense, don’t walk around with an open purse or anything.