Singapore: Places to visit

The Republic of Singapore, or better known as Singapore, is an island country located to the South of Peninsular Malaysia. It is the smallest nation in South East Asia. The tourism industry in Singapore is one of the largest and i guess the only industries for the country, with more than 9 million tourists in 2006 alone.

Hereby I'm gonna list out famous places of Singapore, starting from my most favorites to least.

SENTOSA ISLAND

The Sentosa Island is Singapore’s premier island resort getaway with plenty of attractions and filled with events all year round. You can enjoy the Underwater world, Luge skyride, Tiger tower sky, The Merlion (not the famous one), 3D+4D movies, and beach sports as well. I’ve only been able to cover the half part of the Sentosa but whatever it was It was the best one. You better visit this place during the weekend when it’s more crowded.

Getting there : Get to HarbourFront MRT station and entere VivoCity (If you were born rich you can loose some pocket over here, it’s big shopping mall), There is cable car service which takes you to Sentosa.

Find my all Sentosa picture at below url
http://picasaweb.google.com/abhishek.gondalia/Sentosa#

Underwater World

Singapore’s Underwater World is the largest underwater world in South East Asia. It is situated in the Sentosa Island and is said to be a dream haven which showcases the awe-inspiring beauty of a whole different world beneath the seas. It is home to more than 2500 fishes from over 250 different species. In this Underwater World, you will also see one of the rarest creatures on Earth – the dugong Gracie.

The Merlion

Another night visiting place to get some peace of mind. First time when i went there Merlion was under construction due to lightning fallen on it ( Just imagine it!!) The Merlion is considered to be the mascot of Singapore. It is said to be a mythical beast which is half lion and half fish. It symbolizes courage, resilience and strength of the citizens of Singapore. If you are interested to see this Merlion, there is a 8 meter high status standing at the mouth of the famous Singapore River. Don’t forget to get a picture over her. :)

Getting there : Walk along the riverfront from the Raffles Place MRT Station

Find all Meriol and Suntec Pics at,
http://picasaweb.google.com/abhishek.gondalia/MerlionAndSunte

Clarke Quay

This is a very popular hangout place for those interested in Singapore’s city nightlife.  In this area, you can find a lot of air-conditioned shop houses, push-carts selling mementos, bars, discos and restaurants. Besides there, you can also find a large variety of handicrafts and souvenirs here. A perfect place for shoppers and diners alike.

Getting there : Head to the Riverfront from Clarke Quay MRT Station



Singapore Flyer Observation Wheel

The Singapore Flyer is the world’s largest observation wheel which provides visitors with stunning views of Singapore’s urban cityscape. Located on the south east of Marina Centre, this 42 stories high Flyer offers visitors view up to about 42 kilometers away – including Batam, Bintan and Johor.






Night Safari

After the The world's first wildlife park built for visits at night, the Night Safari is not like any ordinary zoo illuminated by the night or a modern version of nocturnal houses found in many zoos around the globe.

Nestled in 40 hectares of lush secondary forest, the Night Safari offers guests the unique experience of exploring wildlife in a tropical jungle at night. Through the use of subtle lighting technique, guests are able to view over 1,000 nocturnal animals of 100 species in vast naturalistic habitats.
Singapore Zoo

The Singapore Zoo is among the most popular tourist destination in whole of Asia. It has won numerous awards in the past and is highly praised for its open landscape design where the animals live in enclosures which are pretty similar to their natural habitat. The zoo is filled with a wide variety of exotic animals such as the white tigers, polar bears, elephants and others. There are also special exhibitions once in a while such as the golden monkey exhibition. Other than that, the zoo also offers one of the most interesting Night Safari in the world. In this Night Safari, you will be able to experience wildlife on a 45 minutes long tram ride or you can also take one of the three Walking Trails to get a feel of the park at night. It’s one in a lifetime experience to be able to watch over one hundred of different nocturnal animals.

Getting there : Go to Choa Chu Kang MRT Station, and take SMRT Bus 927which will bring you straight to the zoo. Or, you can choose to go to Ang Mo Kio MRT Station and board SBS Transit bus 138

Jurong Bird Park

The Jurong Bird Park is famous for its open-concept bird park which houses more than 600 species of birds. It is also the largest of its kind in Asia Pacific and has the world’s tallest man-made waterfall. Remember to check out the events in order to attend the world-class All Star Bird Show which the park is famous for.





Find all Collected pictures of Zoo, BirdPark and Night safari at,
http://picasaweb.google.com/abhishek.gondalia/ZooBirdParkSingapore

Twitter Comic Strips :D

 

Le me admit it first, I’m twitterholic! Since i learned what this thing is I've got addicted to it. While the whole would is tweeting around i still find plenty of my frnd who don’t even know about it. I just met one of my old classmate and asked him to join me. He said i already have ‘orkut’ so don’t need twitter. That basically because he doesn’t know wat the hack twitting is! 

With just 74 workers and established in 2006, twitter has already become one of the top 10 social networking site (with number being Facebook ( i still hate it).

Nevertheless! This post is not to teach everyone what twitter is, but i found some comic strips which i feel somewhat interesting. Some of them made me laugh in my boring trip here in Singapore. For Twitter lover it’s fun :)

Adiosssssssss!!! Enjoy Tweets, Your friends need it :D

Friendship

True color(indian color) of friendship.

Friendship is not about “I m sorry “  its about “abbe  teri  galti hai “
Friendship is not about “I m there for u” or “I missed u “  it’s about “kahan marr gaya saale  “
Friendship is not about “I understand “  its about “sab teri wajah se hua manhus“
Friendship is not about “I care for u  “  its about “kamino tumhe chhod ke kahan jaunga “
Friendship is not about “I m happy for ur success “its about “chal party de saale“
Friendship is not about “I love that girl“  its about “saalo izzat se dekho tumhari bhabhi hain “

Friendship is not abt “R u coming for outing tomorrow “ its about “ nautanki nahi, hum kal bahar ja rahe hai “

Friendship is not about “Get well soon “ its about “ Itna piyega toh yehi hoga“

Friendship is not about “All the best for ur career“ its about “ bahut hua, abhi toh switch mar saale“

Thanks to one of really good friend for this one PATHIYO>>>>

Navratri Rocks (as usual)

It started with some controversies and partitions in friends, but all ended up in a good way. When we first discussed about the place to rock at, i could smell the issues that we are about to face. The very first one to decide where to go. Choice in vadodara is limited mostly to below two places.

• United Way of Baroda.
• Arkee (I hope the i’ve spelled it correctly.)

So here we go, i wasn’t sure where to move. My obvious choice was “wherever there are more friends”. I had been to Arkee twice and once to United way. I don’t see much difference other than money and beautiful babes. The united way wins in both the cases. Prices are high (as they thing there are more beautiful girls coming here than at Akee.)

Never mind after asking few friend i made an obvious choice of  “United way”. With bhakti not being around i was hopping it to be a rocking event. Some meeting and discussions made all fellow to move at the common place “United Way of Baroda”.

I had this very happy time until heard the news of my Singapore Visit. I missed some fun in last few days. Here are few pictures to enjoy. :)


Navratri Collection 1

From Navratri

Navratri Collection 2

From Navratri

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2008 Navratri blog

Google Wave: Next Big Thing

This is driving me crazy, as the launch date draws nearer, I can’t stop thinking how Google Wave can change the landscape of how we communicate and collaborate online. Much has been promised and we have also seen how some of the cool features can improve the way we work.

I have thought of 10 benefits that we can yield from this highly anticipated platform.

The actual benefits are certainly more than what I am about to list. But till then, this is enough to keep us hyped up.

1. Real time news all in one

To get the latest breaking news, Twitter is arguably the fastest. The only thing that is lacking is solid content and a concerted effort to make the news more informative. With Google Wave, a user such as a witness of the incident can edit, add in his or her comments or share knowledge regarding the news. A journalist’s expertise accompanied by witnesses and users’ opinions will certainly improve real time news quality.

2. Cuts down conversation waiting time

SKYPE, the world’s most popular calling an chat application is good but not great. Often, we have to wait for the other party to type their message even though we know he’s typing something out there and hit enter before we can formulate our thoughts and reply. Fortunately, that’s not the case in Google Wave. Whatever your friend is typing at that moment, you can see it appearing real time and start formulating your thoughts for the next message. It’s like a real verbal conversation with friends.

Great Time saver, really you gonna love this feature.

3. Cool extensions for work and play

To Facebook applications, we can expect quite some Google Wave extensions. These extensions are classified as either robots or gadgets. A robot is an automated participant on a Wave. It can read, edit and share outside content to a Wave. It can also create new Waves, blips and add and remove participants. A gadget is like an application like games and survey forms etc. If you’re having fun with Facebook applications, Google Wave could very well provide the same or higher level of entertainment.

4. Multiple users instant messaging gets easy

It is easy to have multiple friends chatting in a Wave. Simply drag and drop their avatar and they are in the conversation! Most of the time when there are multiple users chatting, it is hard to keep track of who is talking to who exactly. Google Wave helps to organize the conversation in a neat threaded fashion.

5. Easy project collaboration

Collaboration is Google Wave’s specialty. Every Wave works like a wiki or a Google doc. It places everyone’s work into one Wave, real time. This is an extremely useful tool during meetings when everyone can take notes and input their thoughts into a single Wave. At the end of the day, everyone gets the same set of meeting notes, ensuring consistency and avoiding miscommunication.

6. Retrace with playback

You’d probably feel lost when you are new to a Wave your friends just added you into. Don’t be afraid, its playback function helps you understand how the conversation or email has evolved to what it is at the current moment. Putting the playback function in the news context, you can literally see how a breaking news was first reported, commented, updated and concluded.

7. Easy file sharing

File sharing is simple on Google Wave. Just drag and drop the files into the intended Wave (with your Wave members in it) and sharing done!

8. Embedding a Wave to your site

Embedding a Wave into your blog allows you and the other users in the Wave to edit or add new content to it via Google Wave. Changes are as usual real time and comments on your blog posting via Google Wave are automatically updated to your blog.

9. Own a Wave

Just like how companies have their own SMTP email server, companies can also have their own Wave technology. I’m looking forward to have it in my company at least c-sam. :)

Abstract of Google explaination:

…To help potential wave providers get started, our plan is to release an open source, production-quality, reference implementation of the Google Wave client and server, as well as provide an open federation endpoint by the time users start getting access.

That means that you can either use Wave hosted on Google’s infrastructure, or you can have it hosted on your own server, without ever sharing data with Google.

10. Competition drives quality

With the number of benefits Google Wave can bring, as a collaborative and communication platform, it will certainly drive up the quality of what competitors (social sites, cloud computing products and etc) are going to provide in the future.

And guess what, we, as the consumers are the beneficiaries again!

At last I'll leave you guys/gals with the developer presentation that Google had while they introduced this NEXT BIG THING to it’s developer.