Little India, The Arab Quarter, and Peranakan

J went to take his exams. I eventually got myself ready, took Kona for a walk, then came back and walked to Little India. I'll give you a glimpse of my day. I can offer things only for your senses of sight and sound. You can't, unfortunately, smell the garlic or incence, or taste the cardamon tea, or the dosa. Or feel the near 100% humidity that turns the Singapore into a giant sauna.







A park bench. Two men talking. A great trea. Lillies in the pond.












Walking to Little India.












Through the wet market. They called them wet markets in Hong Kong too. It just means the local market, usually in a covered market area. More like things have always been done than a supermarket.

































Western Union, even in the age of internet, is still alive. Indian workers in Singapore use it to send money home to their families.










There were lots of jewelery stores in Little India.





A Hindu temple.





There were also lots of restaurants. This one was Veg Only, and looked air conditioned, so I went in. They had idli on the menu. This is a southern Indian dish we discovered in Kerala. I couldn't resist. It wasn't as good as I remembered.














And dosas too. The idly by themselves would have been enough, but flooded with happy memories, I ordered a dosa too. And some cardamamon tea. (Checking the spelling, I learned that the preferred spelling is with an 'm' at the end, but with an 'n' is an alternative. How come I never noticed before?) I couldn't finish the whole dosa, but it was good.
















I was going to go into the mall, just to see what was in there, and hoping it might be air conditioned, but you had to check your bags and I didn't feel like doing that.







I've been struggling to find some remnants of the Singapore I saw 40 years ago. The laundry is one. They don't do this in the fancy areas of private housing where J lives.













The Alsacoff Arab School. The building in the background shows up later.

























Sultan Mosque












This is the building that is in the background in the picture above of the Alsacoff Arab School.




























This just seemed an interesting culinary juxtaposition.













Peranakan is just going to have to wait for the next post. It's turned from April 29 to May 1 while I was doing this.