By Noemi Gamel

Visiting Singapore has been on my bucket list for years. Its reputation for immaculate cleanliness, international diversity, good food, and fun stuff to do with the family make it a top destination in SE Asia.

The city did not disappoint us! It indeed was very clean. I have never seen bathrooms or a subway station as clean as I did in Singapore. I loved the mix of cultures as the Chinese, Indian, Malaysian, Thai, and Vietnamese worlds blended into one gorgeous microcosm.

While Thailand is known for its pad Thai, Vietnam for its pho, and Cambodia for its Khmer “amok” curry, Singapore does not necessarily have a signature dish. Instead, Singapore is known for its food stalls. The hawker food stalls provide one of the most evident proofs of the Singaporean diversity. When you enter a hawker eating house, you will find hundreds of stalls, each specializing in one dish. All the cultures that come together to contribute to Singapore’s diversity are represented. How do you know which stalls out of the hundreds are the best? As with other places, follow the locals. Chris and Tristan stood for almost half an hour to sample the chicken and rice at the Maxwell Road eating house, and they were not disappointed. Kara and I opted for the curry puffs, being vegetarian.

The food is not the only thing in Singapore that is borne out of a mix of cultures. The architecture features blends of the old, as evident in the Merlion, and the new, which you can see while walking down the waterfront. The Gardens by the Bay also feature modern architecture and breathtaking landscape designs.