Integrated Parking System

During my trip to Singapore, i noticed that in Singapore, you can see how many empty parking spaces in several famous places on the streets because they put the information on a digital panels. The information is updated everytime there's a new car entering or leaving the place, so it's a real time update.

The concept is simple, but the visitors who are planning to go there can take the benefit of this features and decide whether it's a good option to go there or not. Why waste your time and money if there aren't any empty space for you to park your car (unless if you want to use public transportation such as buses or trains).

Since cars are not that much in Singapore due to strict car life cycle regulation, the numbers displayed is always over 500 and sometimes it even reach 1000 for big places, such as Suntec.

Second Visit to Universal Studio

Joy, excitement, and new experiences. These are the three things i got during my second visit to Universal Studio in Singapore today. My first trip to UVS was in October with my wife. At that time, we didn't have any experience on visiting UVS, but luckily, we got almost all of the big shows during our visit.

Today, we went there again with my mother-in-law, my sister-in-law, her husband, and her 20-months daughter. We didn't complete all of the places, because there were more people coming with us, so we got delayed for some time, but since we have seen most of the shows, we skipped some of the attractions which we though it wasn't too interesting to see.

We had some new photos with the movie characters that we didn't get in our first trip, such as Po (Kungfu Panda), Frankenstein, Betty Boop, and Joker. I also played Battle of Galactica and Return of the Mummy, two jet-costers attractions which i didn't play previously. It was a fun and thrilling experience. It's not for everyone. It's for those who have good health and brave enough to pump their adrenalin to the maximum level. Honestly, i didn't brave enough to take the blue ride (Cyclon) as it's more aggressive and includes many twist in the air.

I also enjoyed Transformer The Ride, one of the new attractions that were opened last December 2011. It wasn't available when was coming in October. It was a magnificent attractions and i loved the show very much.

All the great experienced was closed by a wonderful water attractions in Waterfront, called Crane Dance. Different with Songs of the Sea, this attraction is free of charge.

In overall, i'm impressed with RWS. One ticket for all (excluding your own expenses on food, drinks, and gifts). I would recommend you to have express ticket to save more time queuing. SGD 30 is worth spent to save you from frustration and time.

One last interesting thing from my second visit was that there was a wedding celebration held in UVS at 7 PM and the couple has booked the whole New York are for their wedding took place. Guess what? They have the same initials as me and wife do, W&M. We took a picture for that.

Honeymoon Part 1: Singapore Day 4

Day 4 was our last day in Singapore and really, there was nothing special on this day as we only woke up in the morning and prepared our baggage to leave the hotel. We had our last breakfast in the restaurant and then we went back to our room to make our final preparations.

We checked out around 8.45 AM and Mr. Salim already arrived to pick us up to the Changi Airport. We arrived at Changi way too early, so we head to the duty free shop in the airport to see if there's anything we could buy. We did buy some chocolates and stroopwafel and we also enjoyed the massage chair provided for free in Changi.

We left Singapore and we went straight to Bali, our next destination for the next five days. I have been to Bali before but it was long long time ago, so i had little memory about what Bali looks like. My wife never went to Bali before so it was her first trip to Bali.

All the thing in Bali will be posted on the next post by tomorrow

Honeymoon Part 1: Singapore Day 3

In day 3, we went to Singapore Science Center and we went there via MRT to Jurong East station (it was a long trip even with MRT as we have to switch station and travel to the west part of Singapore) and then we picked up Bus 335 which dropped us in front of the building, so we don't have to take 8 minutes walk from the bus terminal.

This place was full of tricks that were based on science, not just fancy technologies and most of the elementary high school in Singapore have an annually plan to visit this place to introduce science to the students in a more fun ways. Believe me, it's a fun place and you will understand lots of new things here as every tricks has a description of how it works and why is it happening.

At the end of the trip, we visited the Omni Theater and watch Hubble show. It was really a fantastic theater and i'm sure you will love it as much as we do because it's huge and it's crystal clear. You will have a wonderful experience after visiting this place and watch the movies.

In our way back, we took the same bus and guess what? It took us more than 30 minutes to reach the bus terminal again . It's faster to walk on foot rather than taking the bus. We didn't know it would be like this as it was our first experience

After getting to the MRT station at Jurong East, we went to Chinatown to buy a BBQ pork for my mother in law and my wife's family. They loved it so much .

After that, we went to Orchard road again and we visited Kinokuniya in Takashimaya. It was a huge book store and it has lots of interesting books i wanted to read, but i didn't have time (and money to buy and read them all). If you want to search for books, i would recommend you to visit this book store and i'm pretty sure you will find what you wanted.

We reached the final day in Singapore and we prep our baggage to leave to Bali in the next day.

See you in the next post about leaving Singapore and start our journey in Bali

Honeymoon Part 1: Singapore Day 2

Our second day was one full day in Universal Studio in Resort World Sentosa. Mr. Salim (our driver) picked us up at 9 AM and we went straight to RWS. Unfortunately, at that day, it was slightly rainy, so we were wet even before we entered the Universal Studio area. We took some photos in the front area where the spinning big globe that has Universal Studio text were located.

There are 7 areas in Universal Studio: Madagascar, Far Far Away, Lost World, Ancient Egypt, Sci-Fi, New York, and Hollywood. I would suggest that you take the left side first, starting with Madagascar and ended at Hollywood in the right side.

The first attraction in Madagascar is Madagascar: A Crate Adventure where you ride a boat and see Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria, and the penguins in action. At the end of the show, you will be surprised with a hidden photo snap. You can view the results when you leave the building.

I didn't take the Party-Go-Round, but my wife did and i only took some photos of her while she was riding. One of my favorite attraction in Madagascar was Madagascar Boogie! where all the casts in Madagascar came in real action with their funny costumes and also "Move It Move It" songs. I really like this song. Don't miss this one as you only have limited time to take pictures with them as they limited the photo session only to 10 minutes. Luckily i got a picture with the Penguins, Donkey, and Gloria.

Next area i visited was Far Far Away where Shrek and Princess Fiona took place. There are 4 attractions on this area, but the most amazing attractions were Shrek 4D Adventure and Donkey Live. As always, Singapore presented a combination between lightning, sound, air, and of course WATER!!! So get ready to be stunned by the amazing 4D adventure that you will never forget. I'm impressed with Donkey Live as the Donkey looks real. It could interact with the guests answer via the video camera installed on that place. As my wife doesn't like a roller-coaster type, we didn't ride all the roller-coaster attractions.

Next was The Lost World. We rode Canopy Flyer™ at this are and my wife was screaming loud . It was fun (at least for me) and enjoyable. I really like to play it again, but the queue line was too long. Also, this kind of attractions were highly influenced with the weather. Since it was kinda rainy at that time, so sometimes we had to wait for some time before we could play again. It's so annoying, but safety came first . My tips: leave your bag, sandals, and any other hand carry items on the free locker so that you don't have to worry about it since it's high-speed roller-coaster.
I was able to saw the WaterWorld, which is designed based on the blockbuster film, "Waterworld". My tips: don't seat in the front row unless you want to get wet

Next area was Ancient Egypt. We didn't take any attractions on this area because most of them are roller-coaster and also for kids . The same goes with Sci-Fi city. All of the attractions on this area are roller-coaster (Battlestar Galactica^®) and spinning cup (Accelerator^®)

Next was New York. The only attraction on this area is Lights, Camera. Action!™ Hosted by Steven Spielberg. He designed this and presented for Universal Studio in Singapore. Again, it combines sound, lightning, fire and water effect to create a unique experience. Please note that you will get wet if you take the first row like i did . The Rockafellas gave a US-style attraction and we watched it while resting a bit. There was also some performance by the audience which makes it more interesting.

The last one is of course Hollywood, the epicenter of Universal Studio. This is the place you will visit the first and the last time since it's the entrance and the exit way. You got a chance to meet Marilyn Monroe and also Charlie Chaplin and take pictures with them (i didn't get the Marilyn Monroe though). Please note that Charlie Chaplin guy was a little bit "naughty"

We were lucky enough to enjoy most of the show in Universal Studio. My brother in law didn't have the same experience as i did.

We also met an Indonesian couple, Yudi and his girlfriend. He came from Bandung. We helped each other to take pictures so we could take pictures with our girl.

By the end of this year, they will add a new show on Universal Studio, which is the Transformer. It should be interesting enough to see. For those who would like to go there on Haloween, Universal Studio is planning to release a special attractions called Halloween Horror Night which is only available on 21-23, and 27-30 of October 2011. Be there or wait another year

We left Universal Studio at 6 PM and we had dinner in Indonesian restaurant in Somerset. We ate nasi padang and Mr. Salim took us back to the hotel and we went on our own before we finally get some rest at night.

That's our second day in Singapore. See you in the next post tomorrow

Honeymoon Part 1: Singapore Day 1

This is the first post of two part series that will contain our (me and my wife) journey during our honeymoon in Singapore and Bali. We will focus on Singapore first and i will continue with other post in Bali later on.

We started our journey at October 3 by leaving to Adisucipto International Airport of Yogyakarta at 6 AM in the morning. Since it was early in the morning, we had no traffic jam during the trip. When we got there, we directly went to the check in station and leave our baggages since we have already checked-in using the web check-in on AirAsia's website (You will have to pay IDR 30000 if you do a local check-in in the counter ). Next, we moved on to the imigration counter and again, since it's early in the morning, we didn't have to wait too long. I only had one person in front of me, so it would take us only 3-4 minutes to complete the imigration process. Our plane goes directly to Singapore and we departed at 7.40 AM.

We arrived in Singapore around 11 AM (there was 1 hour difference between Yogyakarta and Singapore's time) and we were picked up by Mr. Salim, our local guide and driver. He had to wait for an hour since the baggage claim process was a bit late and i had to register for a username/password for WiFI in the information center. Later, i just found out that that username/password was only valid for 4 hours

Mr. Salim is a nice person. Even though he's Singaporean, he could talk Indonesian a bit since he could speak Melayu. We had no problem communicating with him. We stayed at OAsia Hotel, near Novena Square. It's very close to MRT station in Novena since it's under Novena Square, so it's very easy for us to go anywhere in Singapore using MRT station.

In Singapore, we didn't use any local tour since we have been there, so Mr. Salim only acted as our driver. He picked us from the airport of Changi and dropped us at the hotel and we go on our own.

In the first day, we only went to Orchard to take a walk and also to Chinatown to buy dinner using MRT. Something funny happened when i tried to use Google Maps in Singapore on my iPad. It gave me the opposite direction so i had some argument with my wife over this technology. I posted on Twitter and someone replied to me that i should try Street Directory instead of Google Maps. Unfortunately, i haven't had time to test this feature as i only used Street Directory to find information about places, not direction to that place.

Since my wife didn't bring her EZ-Link card, she had to buy a new one in Singapore and it costs her SGD 12 and she got SGD 7 as the balance, cheaper than previous card which cost me SGD 15 (but i got SGD 10 balance) last year. The card was different with what i got. Later on, i found out that EZ-Link produced new card and they are going to replace the old card with the new one. The old EZ-Link card will still be usable until the end of this year and if you do have one, it's time to refund the old one and buy the new one. Luckily, mine is still considered new (mine is still the blue version, but it has longer serial number compared to the six digit in the old one).

That's all for day one in Singapore. We will continue with day 2 tomorrow

I'm Back

I'm back from my honeymoon trip to Singapore and Bali. It's been an amazing week together with my wife. The Singapore trip wasn't my first time as i have been there last year, but i got a chance to go to Universal Studio and this is my first time to go there, so i had something different this time.

My experience to Bali was actually not the first time either, but i went to Bali when i was a child and at that time, i didn't have a chance to go anywhere, so let's just consider this is my first time to Bali and i enjoyed it so much.

I will start posting again by tomorrow and i will try to tell my stories on this blog starting at day 1. It will be splitted into two parts: Singapore and Bali. I think it will be a long story, so stay tune for tomorrow as i have to get some sleep right now

Singapore Flood

I found this video on my Echofon, it's very hilarious. It's talking about the flood that attacked Singapore few weeks ago. Mr Brown make a new lyrics based on FIFA's World Cup song and release it as a new The Wave Song

Great Singapore Sale

One thing i like about Singapore is that they are very smart to attract people from around the world to visit their country and earns a lot of money from them. One of the simple way is by tourism. Singapore is holding another Great Singapore Sale Shop event which is held annually.

This year, this event will start next May 28 and ends in July 25. What are you waiting for? Start looking for tickets to Singapore and start filling your MUST-BUY items