Last week SCENIC WRITER’S SHACK spent three days in SINGAPORE – enroute to South Korea.
Here’s 10 (mostly) yummy takeaways…
I discovered, courtesy of the in-flight entertainment offered by Singapore Airlines, the movie CREED 3 is a near scene-by-scene remake of ROCKY 5. Is that an exaggeration? Yes, but only just.
Unlike in Australia where inflation has grown wings and gnashing teeth, upwardly mobile prices appear to still be in check in Singapore.
One of the perks of people-watching – especially if you count yourself a reader – is clocking up your daily word-count scanning t-shirt slogans. These are three t-shirts I saw on actual humans while walking the streets of Singapore.
The ‘Just a Girl’ fashion piece was spotted on a girl btw, as opposed to the one above. Don’t know why that needed clarifying, but SWS has always had a soft spot for authenticity so maybe that’s it. I really don’t know.
Humidity, thy name is Singapore. Brisbane born and bred, I got my ‘hummer’ license a long time ago. And two years (2010/2011) sweating it out in the Torres Straits added my Captain’s stripes.
But nothing and I mean nothing – could have prepared me for humidity on this scale. Sink or swim? We literally swam in the lather of our own perspiration for three days and nights.
Can you believe the lowest temperature ever recorded in Singapore – back in 1934 – was a balmy nineteen degrees? Really.
Spruce architecture and stylin’ buildings? Yep, Singapore does that pretty well.
The piece of magnificence with the cruise ship built on top pictured below?
We got to eye-ball that one up-close. A thing of improbable beauty like that you should have to pay for the privilege. Might even rent a room in it one year. Now THAT you would have to pay for. A heap.
Yeah, they go. Even faster than the ones I remember in Tokyo twenty years back. Then again, that WAS twenty years ago. Sort of like comparing internet speed from the early 2000’s with the ‘ol blue cord plug-in to now, I guess. Something you wouldn’t do. Ordinarily. I guess.
Staging this picture of my 13-year-old daughter Lia cost me, by my own estimate, roughly two kilograms in sweat. The other-worldly reverse-sinkhole effect was the goal here. It was the goal of 60 other people who lined up that steamy morning as well.
The super-heated waiting transformed every suffering soul in the que to a liquid state by the time they’d reached the front. We got the shot we came for. We got it and we earnt it!
You can’t tell from this picture – taken from the website of the hotel we stayed in – because they’re using the ‘ol smoke and mirrors trick (with heavy emphasis on the mirrors part) to make this broom-cupboard-sized-gym appear 100 times larger than it actually was, but trust me… it was built for the likes of Antman. A skinny Antman at that.
So squished and micro was this place I had to breath in every time another person who was in there with me would do a barbell curl – just to make room.
I love my retro, and the hotel foyer carpeted stairs delivered in spades. Nothing like licorice–all–sorts design to bring those 70’s memories flooding back.
I remember my mother returning from a trip to Singapore in the 1970’s. She mentioned how they had licorice-flavoured chewing gum.
This ‘meat shake’ at Burger King (Hungry Jacks in Australia) easily tops that in the weird food stakes. No offence Singapore but the cartoon guy with the letter ‘S’ on his t-shirt is me running a mile.
Yep, they’ve got one of these. And we went. And I want to thank the place for briefly renewing my love of a music band I used to like love adore back in the 2000’s.
Everyone at the park that day – for some reason – was treated to a selection of songs by the CRYSTAL METHOD over the grounds loud speakers.
Thank you Universal Studios Singapore!
For a country of less than six million people, Singapore packs a punch. And a lot of sparkle.
They were three happy days in Singapore. But wait… there’s more HERE.
It’s been said that Rocky 5 was a failure in terms of its box office success but my opinion is that it was a quality film.
The scene where Tommy drives off after an altercation with Rocky and then his argument with Adrian was a moment of pure gold action. These Creed movies don’t compare to the brilliance of any Rocky movie.
But I am very biased….
I could write a whole blog post pointing out how the Creed movies seem like a plastic imitation of the Rocky films without the heart of the originals, but doing that just makes me feel…well, old I guess is the best word for it.
After the ROCKY franchise came to its end in 2006 with the sixth film ROCKY BALBOA, they had to take it in another direction if they wanted the journey – and themes of struggle and triumph – to continue.
CREED 3 is the first of the spin-off series Stallone doesn’t appear in. Stallone’s been quoted as saying he’s a sentimentalist and because the tone of this film is so much more darker he wanted nothing to do with it.
Do you remember the scene in ROCKY 5 when Adrian is trying to console Rocky that his new protege Tommy Gun might have the technical skills but he just doesn’t have the heart that Rocky has?
That’s EXACTLY how I see the Creed movies – complete with all their gangsta-rap soundtracks, which I’ll admit, is a massive turn-off for me from the get-go. The thing is, the new generations coming through won’t notice the quality difference because Creed is the product out now and they’d have to go back to the archives to see any Rocky material – which they probably won’t do.
For the older folk who are in a position to compare, well… the CREED franchise is still about boxing I guess, but it’s just not the same. Sentimentalist? If that’s good enough for Stallone to admit he’s that then it’s good enough for me too.
Can I get a ‘Yo Adrian’?
Sounds like it was a fun trip! Love the retro stairs! Was it new retro or was that the original carpet from the 70s? I didn’t know meat shakes existed or would be appetizing to any one. So that made me search and I discovered that meat smoothies are supposedly popular with body builders and meat lovers…I guess you’d have to love meat but not love chewing.
I reckon that carpet on the foyer stairs was new but the carpet in the corridors outside the actual rooms was ratty and worn enough it could very well have been there since… well, maybe not the 70’s, but possibly the 90’s.
And the meat smoothies/shakes? Yeah, I can picture there being a definite market there amongst the bodybuilding set.