Monday: Museums and McDonald's

This past week was incredibly busy! We had a TON of reading and a test on friday. I hardly got to do any activities around Singapore this week (or not nearly as many as last week) because I was so busy studying. However the weekend was very busy! I'll write about it in a separate post because I have a lot to say (we went to the zoo on Sunday and spent the say with a local student on Saturday). However I did get to do a few small things this week.

Monday our entire group went to the National Museum of Singapore. The museum was very nice and had a lot of cool exhibits about Singapore living. However I thought we were supposed to be in the History exhibit the entire time so I did not get to see many of the other exhibits. The history exhibit was very well put together and interesting though. The funny thing about Singapore is that all the museums are controlled by the government, so it was a bit propaganda-ish. There was an "events path" which showed the history of Singapore through concrete events, and a "personal path" that showed the history through the views of regular people who usually don't make the history books. I wandered back and forth between the both and was very impressed. There was also an audio tour that was very fancy and came with an interactive computer. Unfortunately I couldn't listen to everything, it would have taken hours! When we left I noticed the Singapore Art Museum across the street, hopefully I will find time to get back there!

I joined in on the Asian sun-umbrella trend on my walk to the museum! Asian ladies want white skin, they even feel whitening creme at the stores! Such a difference from the tanning lotions of America.

The National Museum of Singapore

Later in the evening some of the other girls and I went to a McDonald's to get ourselves some western food and see what McDonald's was like halfway across the world. It was much fancier than an American McDonald's, but the food choices were pretty much the same. They didn't have ranch dressing though :( When I asked for some ranch the man at the counter looked at me like I was crazy! They only had BBQ sauce, sweet and sour, and curry. Apparently in Singapore and other places in Asia, McDonald's is considered somewhat nice place to get a bite to eat!

Trying to study at McDonald's! It looks nothing like the American McDonalds'.