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Lying almost
on the equator, Singapore is a thriving city-state that has
overcome its dearth of natural resources to become one of the
juggernaut economies of Asia. In the crowded streets of Chinatown,
fortune tellers, calligraphers and temple worshippers are still
a part of everyday life. In Little India, you can buy the best
sari material, freshly ground spices or a picture of your favourite
Hindu god. In the small shops of Arab St, the cry of the imam
can be heard from the nearby Sultan Mosque.
Singapore may have traded in its rough-and-ready opium dens
and pearl luggers for towers of concrete and glass, and its
steamy rickshaw image for hi-tech wizardry, but you can still
recapture the colonial era with a gin sling under the languorous
ceiling fans at Raffles Hotel. It is this carefully stage-managed
combination of Western modernity and treasured Eastern and
colonial past that makes Singapore such an accessible slice
of Asia.
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