Up this morning, on our last day – but we don’t have to leave the hotel – the lovely Hilton Orchard – until 3 pm (thank you, Mae!) at which time we will check out and make our way to Changi Airport. So, looking at possible things to do, we decided to play it “safe” (ie. something indoors, in case of rain!) we opted for the Asian Civilizations Museum. So glad we did!
Had our last great breakfast in the Executive Lounge about 8, and are now all packed up and ready to go. Just have to change into our “traveling clothes” before we check out. Down about 9:45 am and got a Grab which dropped us at the Museum a few minutes after 10 am, their opening time.
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| Sir Stamford Raffles, Founder of Singapore |
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| Some unusual architecture along the River! |
Truly a world class museum! The first exhibit you come to is the Tang Shipwreck, which was uncovered in 1989, and was a ship heading from China to the Near East loaded with ceramics and textiles for trade. While most of the ship and all of the textiles did not survive, basically all of the ceramics did! To the tune of almost 60,000 pieces! After careful excavation and restoration, many of the pieces are displayed in the museum, and many are of really beautiful quality, as you will hopefully see from the photos.
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| Huge ceramic containers |
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| And hundreds of bowls! |
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| This is how they were stored (and found!) |
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| Some stunning furniture! |
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| Torah scroll holders |
From the Tang shipwreck, we wandered through other maritime shipwrecks; lots and lots of porcelain. The second floor had to do with religions in Southeast Asian, and covered more than I ever knew existed, which is why there are just a few photos with not much identifying information; sorry!
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| Used for Jewish celebrations |
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| Used for Jewish celebrations |
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| Not sure who or for what this was used ... |
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| But loved the face on this guy... |
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| Play! |
Floor two also featured their current exhibition, which was all about “play!” It was great! It covered ancient games to current games – and boy, the Chinese especially liked to play many things – from chess in a variety of forms to Mahjong, cards and we even ran into a variety of Parchesi boards – foldable! (When I was a kid, mine was definitely not foldable, except in half!!) Who knew?! Additionally, they had stations set up where you could play games, not only with your friends, but with a computer as well! It was really a lovely exhibition, and do you all know that the latest world Chess Champion, crowned last year in Singapore, is an 18-year-old Indian, who defeated the prior Chinese World Champion? Learn something every day!
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| Fancier Parchesi board than I ever had! |
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| Need a hand?? Sorry... |
Floor three covered Asian ceramics (yes, more!) as well as unusual jewelry and textiles. Unfortunately, the textiles display was very poorly lit, and even my magic camera couldn’t pick things up (and flash wasn’t permitted) which is unfortunate! However, we had a lovely look around and enjoyed the entire venue!
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| Golden belt |
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| Deb liked 23 - finger nail protector |
As it was now about noon-time, and we had seen everything, we left the museum and took a nice walk down shady Clarke key, which was lovely. Then, over the Cavanaugh Bridge and to the Fullerton Hotel, where we caught a Grab back to our Hotel. Figured I would post this before we got on the road!
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| Asian Civilization Museum |
So – I’m thinking you probably won’t be hearing from me again until we get home, so, bon voyage and love to you all!
m
xxx
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