My thoughts after spending 2 weeks in Asia.

What’s good everybody.

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I just got back from vacation, where I spent a combined two weeks in Singapore and Hong Kong with my girlfriend and my grandparents. It was a long trip, and I have many thoughts about the entire trip, so let’s get into it.

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Singapore

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Our first stop was Singapore, and I’d like to start off by saying, the idea of Singapore is insane by itself. For those who may not be aware, Singapore is an island country and city state located on the southern tip of Malaysia in Southeast Asia.

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Meaning this entire country, which isn’t that large to begin with, is one unified entity and the entire city of Singapore is the same thing as the country of Singapore. Just one city, just one state, just one country.

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Coming from the United States, this is obviously different because we have states and counties and such, and it’s a little weird to wrap your head around at first.

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Not only that, but it is also one of the wealthiest countries in Asia based on GDP per capita along with other countries like Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

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So it’s almost as if in this one small country in the middle of Southeast Asia, the entirety of all of the wealthiest individuals and global businesses all congregate here to do business and live here. And it definitely looks that way too.

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Everywhere you go there are the most beautiful and impressive buildings, art installations, malls, and city planning that I’ve ever seen. It’s easily one of the most impressive and beautiful cities I’ve ever been to. Half of the city is blended with modern and brutalist architecture, with plants and garden booming out of the sides and tops of buildings.

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It’s as if the skyscrapers were built and then gardens began growing out of the sides of them over time, and it looks pretty awesome.

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They also had some of the most impressive interior architecture for hotels, malls, and everything else that I’ve ever seen. Everywhere you look, you would see an insane water fountain installation or some sort of crazy statue shooting out of the ground.

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It’s almost as if the wealthiest people from all over Asia all agreed to come to this one country, pay the money to make it as nice as humanly possible, and then agreed to live there as their own little paradise.

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While all these things are objectively great, the main downsides of this place would have to be:

1. Everything is pretty expensive (naturally)
2. It’s hot as shit

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Cost of living here was overall quite expensive according to many of the locals we were speaking to, but there were definitely ways around it that we found.

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Public transportation is certainly a thing and it’s pretty robust and easy to use the subway system and bus.

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Eating out at restaurants was quite expensive also. But to save some money we would often eat at these areas around the cities called Hawker Centers, which are these huge food courts with over 30 mini restaurants.

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There you could find all kinds of different food vendors for dirt cheap prices. This was one of the most clutch things about this place, because at a regular restaurant it would easily cost you up to $100 for 4 people. But at a Hawker Center you could get a whole meal and beers for just around $15.

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But the heat, man, that shit is crazy. It’s extremely humid there, and just a 5-10 minute walk across two city blocks will have you sweating through your clothes in no time. I will say though, after the 4-5 days we spent there, I think I did start to get used to it, but I was ready to go considering I only brought one pair of shorts for the whole trip and like 3 pairs of pants.

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I simply did not show up prepared for a life in Singapore at the time.

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Hong Kong

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Part two of our trip took place in Hong Kong. We went here because it’s actually where my grandparents met and lived before choosing to move to America in the 1950’s.

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I was excited to see Hong Kong again, being that I had been there once before over 10 years ago when I was only 13 years old. Back then, I fell in love with it. The dirty city lifestyle really took a hold of me when I was a teenager living in the Sacramento suburbs, and for years I would always remember my time fondly. So I wanted to see if it would hold up against my memory.

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What I discovered is… I actually ended up liking Hong Kong all over again, but this time for different reasons.

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When I was younger, it felt like this huge international city that was so far away from my home but was so impressive because of the sheer size and atmosphere of the city. To tell you the truth, it didn’t take much to impress my 13 year old brain back then.

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This time, what really impressed me was just the pure chaos and over populated nature of everything going on in that city. It turns out, that Hong Kong is actually insanely small, and everything is packed and condensed into this one tiny little island on the souther tip of China.

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So once you get into the actual city, everything is so packed in you can’t even see the sun poking through the buildings unless you’re looking straight up. There are just infinite thousand foot buildings as far as you can see, and it feels like you’re trapped in this urban hellscape. Not to mention the thousands of people walking around at all hours of the day.

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It made me feel like I was in Blade Runner walking through the shitty streets of some city, where the ground is dirty as shit, people are everywhere, and the buildings are so large they tower over you everywhere you go.

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It creates a sort of chaos and smallness that for some reason was really cool to me.

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The food was good as well. Everything we ate were the standard Chinese foods that I’ve been eating throughout my life. Everything from Xiu Mai’s to Bolo Bao’s, but they all tasted better because we were getting them straight from the source.

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Although there was this one time when we met up with my grandparents friends who lived in Hong Kong, and they took us out for dinner to have roasted pigeons. I’ve never seen roasted pigeons before let alone eat one, and I felt the pressure and my girlfriend and I dug in.

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It honestly wasn’t that bad, it reminded me of duck actually. But the fact that it was literally the entire pigeon that was roasted and just put onto my plate, with the head, eyes, and feet and everything did give me pause.

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I guess I’m just not that asian. I don’t even like eating chicken feet if I’m being honest. When animals are still shaped like animals when I’m eating them, it’s a little bit weird for me.

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The weather itself was, in my opinion, better than in Singapore. It was a little bit humid but then also colder on some other days. It allowed us to wear other things and layer besides just sweating our balls off in the hot and humid air like in Singapore.

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I also notice that people dress much better in Hong Kong compared to Singapore. Maybe because of the more temperate weather, maybe because Chinese people care more about what they wear, or maybe because it has more of a big city/concrete jungle atmosphere compared to Singapore.

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But one thing is for sure, the drip was indeed present.

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Realizations Back Home

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After a grueling 14 hour flight, we finally returned back to America. And over the coming days and weeks, I definitely started to notice some stark differences between the two cultures.

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One of the biggest things I noticed was there was a huge difference in the homogenous cultures of Asia, starkly compared to the overly independent and rebellious culture in the States. In Asia, everyone simply just follows the rules, and nobody really seemed to be worried about if anyone was potentially going to steal from them or break into their cars.

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I also noticed a huge difference of nobody really being so wrapped up and enraged with social and political issues. Compared to America where there is constant drama in the news, and people feeling so opinionated about it and carry it with them everywhere they go. Everyone in Asia for the most part was just purely going about their own lives and their day to day, not so wrapped up with the big issues in the news.

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And I must say it was quite refreshing. Not having to feel this subtle tension in the air of society where everyone is so concerned over this or that social issue with government officials or celebrities was quite a noticeable difference.

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Say what you will about the government of Hong Kong and Singapore, they surely aren’t perfect either, but from what I could see, everybody was just vibing.

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Obviously I’m probably biased and am as not well versed in the dividing social issues in each country as much as I am the Untied States, but I think there is definitely a different approach vibe the peoples of each country, for better or for worse.

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Just an observation.

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With all of that being said, Asia is dope. Can’t wait to go back.

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I'm looking forward to the next time I get to get outside of America.