Apartments, apartments, stores and food courts...

Common street view with apartments

After entering Singapore and experiencing a 45 minute "mass rapid transit"-ride in a very crowded train, I arrived at my station. Yet another 10 minutes walk I arrived at the hostel, which is not exactly what I hoped for. Maybe my standards are too high? Maybe housing is too expensive in Singapore? One way or another, I have to sleep 3 months on a mattress which could kill somebody as it is harder than brick.
After reporting to the university (NTU) and having walked to almost any place on the campus (I didn't figure out the free shuttle service), I started exploring the surroundings of the hostel a bit.
I noticed that Singapore consist of almost only apartment buildings. For what I have seen I can easily say that 85% of the island is covered with apartments having 10 floors or more. Moreover, every five apartments building, or so, has its own little shopping center of 4 shops or more. And if you are lucky you can find a food court in the neighborhood. To be precise, let me explain what a food court is; a food court is a large terrace, which is covered to keep the rain out, with a lot of food stalls around it where you can buy a lot of different kinds of food for less than €2,- a meal.

Food court close-up

As tomorrow is the start of the Lunar New Year, today the shops where closed... ouch... Now I don't have any thing to eat in the afternoon and I am hoping that the McDonalds (which is opened 24 hours a day) is also opened tomorrow. Maybe the Muslim food stalls, which were the only ones opened today, are also opened tomorrow.
Newsflash... Just found a website with information about the Lunar New Year in Singapore. All festivities are later in the week, or have already occurred. Tomorrow and the day after the shops will be closed (family affairs?), though the shops in Little India and the Arab Quarter should be open. Maybe I can take a look there tomorrow. Or maybe I will take the day off to rest as I have still a jet lag.