Shopping in Asia Trilogy: Shopping in Heavenly Singapore

Shopping in Asia Trilogy: Shopping in Heavenly Singapore

Kuala Lumpur’s wide array of shopping malls would have been a material bliss if I had not come from Singapore a few days ago, a country where inhabitants are described fondly as educated, ambitious, hard-working and materialistic. They work hard, play hard and like to indulge in material things. Singapore has the largest percentage of mobile phone users in the world. They probably have the biggest expense for cars, paying at least 15000 SGD (~15000 USD) more just to own it. (I knew two people who paid 17000 and 19000 SGD.) No, this is not the cost of a car.

This is the extra money a car-owner in Singapore has to fork out to purchase/bid on a Certificate of Entitlement, the permission or license to own a car as Singapore government imposes strict quotas on the number of cars allowed on the street per year. The license ties to the car and not the person, therefore if he buys a new car, he needs to buy another license. People don’t buy a used car because the license doesn’t transfer. Additionally, the license expires after ten years, requiring the car-owner to buy a new one. There is still a lot of cars, shiny brand-new cars, in Singapore despite the over-the-top efficient public transportation.

This Asian Tiger tries to present itself as a world-class, best of this and first-of-that in everything, which in a way it is. Being very young and small, Singapore has few if not none of the authentic, ancient sights which characterize ‘exotic’ Asia, but oh boy this modern country surely makes up for it by the sheer amount of world-class, best-of-ETC man-made attractions.

Among the gazillions of such attractions are the hundreds of…well, if you put hard-working, wealthy, materialistic people in a place with nothing to see, you end up with a lot of…
Tada…SHOPPING MALLS

Singapore was full of shopping malls like Kuala Lumpur, the capital of its northern neighbor, but at least malls in Singapore were located in different designated areas like Orchard Road, Sim Lim Square, Vivocity, Little India, Chinatown, etc.. and didn’t take center stage as Kuala Lumpur. I could, thus, avoid and choose when I wanted to be bombarded by the abundance of Singapore.

I don’t understand though why Singapore bothers to claim a spot in fashion destinations when there is one kind of weather all year round. Hot, hot hot. Every day walking on the street, I wished I could take my hat off, my top off, my pants off, everything off. Who needs boots, hat, scarves, socks in this kind of weather.

I managed to avoid the shopping scene in Singapore altogether until the power cord of my Mac laptop broke. Buying a replacement for a proprietary brand like Apple was incredibly challenging. I couldn’t just get it from any computer shop. I had to find an Apple reseller or a computer store selling Apple’s products (other than iPhones and iPads). The store is located in a mall, but not all malls had an Apple store. When I found one, each shouted 98 SGD (~98 USD). No way I would pay that amount for a simple power cord, therefore I ended up doing the very thing I swore off before arriving in Singapore: stay away from the malls. In my last couple of days in Singapore, I waltzed in and out air-conditioned metros into air-conditioned shopping malls asking “Do you sell Apple?” Upon seeing the neck-slashing price of the Mac power cord, I asked “Do have second-hand?” or “Do you have a fake Chinese brand?” All I got back was “No, sorry we only have a real one. We only have it new. It’s Singapore. Sorry!”

In a different trip, I would have found Singapore’s high-class, user-friendly shopping paradise a heavenly experience if hadn’t spent a week before experiencing a shopping hell in Hong Kong.

Photo credit: yoursingapore.com