Its just 30 hours in the new city and hence I cant really comment. But just a few striking facts.
When I came down to Changi Airport, the lobby to welcome the foreigners is just tooo good. I guess it almost matches lobbbies of best 5-stars in Mumbai if not better! Too Good! Generally, people say immigration is very tedious process, Singapore is like a bliss! My flight landed at 7.20 and by 7.40, I had my baggage in hands! No hassles at all!!
What struck me at airport (and later in City) is cleanliness. Not a wrapper on the floor. I have seen that in India as well but the places are far and few. Here, the entire city is the same. Too good! (btw, I have heard its S$500 fine for loitering and people do have to pay up!)
Transportation and Infrastructure - One of the seniors told us that Singapore has best roads in the world and MRT (Mass Rapid Transit - equivalent of railways in Mumbai) is its pride! After travelling in Mumbai railways for years, I found it MRT a lil too odd. I had to hold the rods for support myself - I could not rely on the crowd to support me. The buses again are too different from Mumbai with more spacious and luxurious! Another thing - I really loved the ticketing system - you just need to tap a card while boarding and again while getting off - no queues at all which saves hell lot of time!
All those public private partnership case study seekers have an excellent example here - SMRT (Govt) and SBS Transit (Private) together run the entire MRT and buses system. I think the routes are divided and the service qualities are almost equal. Also, for public conveinience, the EZ Link Card can be used in both MRT as well as buses. Mumbai - please learn - if a scheme is started by Western Railways, ensure the same accomodates Central Railways and Harbour Line too. We need the entire service under one roof and not bickering among the government entities. No wonder, people said that I will Singapore! So much convienience!
I found communication system a lil too funny. Firstly, its a big pain to find coin operated public phone booths. Everyone here uses calling cards and you need to swipe the cards for talking. On airport, luckily I could do away with credit card - but in city (in absence of mobile (or handphone in Singapor parlance)), I had to hunt to get to machine where it accepted the coins. Luckily, unlike India, the shop keepers are cooperative of giving you as much change you want. Coming back, for an outsider, its completely lost out feeling if you do not have any other means of communication. Another thing, after living India where it was so convenient about getting calls because "incoming was free", it was quite a shocker to see that you are getting charges almost at same rate as an outgoing call. You can only avoid "incoming call" charge by swicthing to postpaid connection only. Even funnier stuff, with som IDD thingy, I can call to India at really low rates of 8 cents a minute - however, my local call charge is 16 cents a minute!!!
Overall, I love Singapore but the place I am staying is far from what actually is Singapore... more in next post....
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