After five years in Singapore, the famous things no longer surprise me very much. I know about the architecture, the food, the prices, the rules and the prohibitions. What still catches me are the small, everyday things — the ones nobody puts in a tourist brochure.
- Taxi drivers can make you carsick 🚕🤢
- Tap water isn’t cold 💧
- Mice on the beach 🏖️🐁
- The air gets stale in the apartment 🌬️
- You constantly need to do laundry 🧺
- Restaurant service can be strange 🍽️
- The choice: insects or lizards 🪳🦎
- It’s hard to pass on narrow sidewalks 🚶♀️🚶🚶♂️
- The food is incredibly diverse 🦑👀
- The animals I expected to be dangerous 🐊🐍
- Repair often means replace 🛠
- Your friends will leave sooner or later 🧳✈️
1. Taxi drivers can make you carsick 🚕🤢
By big-city standards, it is fairly easy to get around Singapore by car. But a taxi ride can come with a strange problem. Many drivers “play” with the accelerator: press, release, press, release. Back and forth. Aty-aty. You may not notice it at first, but after fifteen minutes I am usually starting to feel sick.
Why do they do this? No one really knows. There’s a myth that it tricks the meter into charging the passenger more, but that’s unlikely. Some speculate it’s to save fuel, though that seems strange, especially with hybrid cars.
Occasionally, there might also be a strange smell in the taxi. Some drivers put dry leaves in the cabin that emit a scent resembling dried skin. To imagine this smell, you could scrape some skin off your heels and leave it to dry for a few days. Yes, it’s disgusting.
2. Tap water isn’t cold 💧
What’s better than washing your face with cold water in the morning? It’s a great way to wake up and feel refreshed. However, in Singapore, this is a luxury you can’t afford. The tap water is just a bit cooler than room temperature and doesn’t refresh you like cold water would. I often don’t even turn on the gas heater and shower under this “cold” water, and it’s quite comfortable.
Once, in an office building, I saw a pipe labeled “chilled water.” I thought maybe this was the cold water I’d been missing for washing my face. But it turned out that this special water was meant for air conditioning systems.
By the way, drinking tap water in Singapore is completely safe, and it tastes good. But it’s not cold!
3. Mice on the beach 🏖️🐁
Picture this: you’re in a cozy corner of East Coast Park, and evening has arrived. A soft sandy beach stretches before you, painted in sunset colors. The air is no longer too hot, a gentle breeze caresses your skin, and the soothing sound of the surf lulls you into a calm state. You are comfortably settled on the sand right at the water’s edge. Perhaps you’re holding a glass of fragrant wine or a tasty sandwich, and next to you is someone special whom you truly love. An idyllic scene, full of harmony and tranquility.
Unfortunately, the perfect moment does not last. Once the sun has gone down, a different population takes over the beach: mice. They seem to appear from everywhere — at times it feels like thousands of them — scurrying across the sand and squeaking in the dark. They are not interested in attacking you, but they are very good at destroying romance.
4. The air gets stale in the apartment 🌬️
Singapore is hot. Daytime temperatures commonly sit around 28–30°C, and the humidity makes it feel hotter. Nights are not exactly cool either. So many residents, especially expats, keep the air conditioning running for hours.
There is one problem that is easy to miss. Most split-unit air conditioners cool and dry the air but do not bring in fresh air from outside. With the windows closed, carbon dioxide can build up and the room starts to feel stale. That can contribute to headaches and sleepiness.
The change is surprisingly hard to notice. The room still feels cool and fresh, even when the ventilation is poor. I use carbon-dioxide sensors to tell me when it is time to open a window. It would be nice to live with the windows open and forget the air conditioner altogether. I am not there yet.
5. You constantly need to do laundry 🧺
If you decide to go for a daytime stroll through the streets of Singapore, there’s a high chance you’ll sweat a lot. If the walk is long, you’ll probably end up soaked. Because of this, you have to wash your clothes frequently. For instance, you can’t wear the same T-shirt two days in a row. Well, technically, no one will stop you from doing that, but it’s better not to.
Singapore’s climate made me appreciate synthetic sports clothing. I used to think synthetic fabric was simply inferior to natural material. Here I discovered that good technical fabrics handle sweat well and dry much faster after getting soaked.
Occasionally, I see people walking the streets of Singapore in trousers, classic long-sleeve shirts, and even blazers without breaking a sweat. How is this possible? Maybe they’re some kind of aliens.
6. Restaurant service can be strange 🍽️
Singapore has plenty of expensive restaurants, but in my experience a high price does not guarantee good food or attentive service. Bills normally include a 10% service charge, and tipping is not generally expected. The atmosphere can therefore feel much more relaxed than the price suggests.
It’s no surprise that dishes can be served in any order: soup, salad, main course, and dessert — all at once. This aligns with a local tradition where the serving order isn’t that important. It’s best to clarify with the waiter the preferred sequence of dishes.
Another issue can be the staff’s overly literal adherence to instructions without considering the situation. For instance, you might be relocated to another spot several times in an empty restaurant, with the reason being reserved tables that will likely remain empty, especially if it starts to rain in an open restaurant.
A particularly surprising feature of local restaurants (even high-end ones) is the way they wash and sort cutlery. Imagine this: in the middle of the dining room, in plain view, there’s a basket of spoons, forks, and knives. A waiter approaches, starts wiping them down, and noisily tosses them back. This happens amid the regular restaurant atmosphere — people eating, chatting, music playing — while the sound of clattering cutlery fills the air. When I once complained about this to the manager, she was surprised and said I was the first to notice it.
7. The choice: insects or lizards 🪳🦎
In a tropical apartment, some kind of wildlife will probably appear sooner or later. I have seen cockroaches above the fortieth floor. In Singapore, the choice sometimes feels simple: lizards or insects. A gecko named Gennady lived under my fridge for several years, eating cockroaches and ants. I assumed geckos were silent. Mine made a surprisingly loud and strange noise. At first I was afraid of him; then I realised Gennady was better than cockroaches. We had an agreement: he ate the insects, and I pretended he did not exist.
Geckos are quite common here. In the evening, they sit on the walls and ceilings of buildings, waiting for their prey. They’re good!
8. It’s hard to pass on narrow sidewalks 🚶♀️🚶🚶♂️
I live in the Joo Chiat district, and there are many shophouses here — traditional two- or three-story buildings with shops or bars on the first floor and residences above. These buildings are designed to form a special covered gallery that protects pedestrians from rain and sun. This passage even has its own name: “five-foot way,” which comes from a British colonial rule requiring a covered passage of at least five feet wide for pedestrians.
I walk through these charming but narrow passages every day, and it’s a rather strange experience. For instance, other pedestrians might start following behind you. For some reason, locals consider overtaking to be impolite, and you may end up with a whole “queue” of people behind you. It’s difficult to navigate through these “clusters,” especially if you have a stroller. You have to move at the speed of the slowest pedestrian in line. Yes, politeness can be pointless and ruthless! Or, someone might follow you closely while looking at their phone, using you as a guide. At some point, this becomes irritating, and I stop to “shake off my tail.”
Singapore drives on the left, and in my experience pedestrians often keep left too. The same habit appears on escalators, where people generally stand on the left. It took me a while to adjust. Now, whenever I visit Europe, I have to adjust all over again.
Since there are many tourists here, navigating the five-foot way is quite tricky. People approach you from all sides and have no intention of giving way. It’s surprising to see the “next-level politeness” of locals, who, seeing that I’m European, try to yield to my right. That’s over the top.
Please, always walk on the left side in Singapore!
9. The food is incredibly diverse 🦑👀
I love trying different foods and discovering new flavors. However, even after five years in Singapore, I haven’t had the chance to try most of what’s available in the food courts. Of course, there are quite a few things I avoid: various innards, slimy soups, watery porridges, strange seafood, and other questionable dishes. It takes a while to figure out, “What was that, and why does it exist?” It took me two years to understand the essence of Chicken Rice. But I still haven’t grasped the purpose and nature of Laksa. I’m fairly familiar with Thai and Indian cuisines, while Indonesian and Malaysian cuisines still leave me uncertain. I’m trying to explore Chinese cuisine, but it’s so vast and diverse that it’s hard to predict what else is out there.
The same goes for supermarkets and grocery stores. I wander through them like they’re museums: walking around, examining the shelves, and most of the products remain a mystery to me. The sections with different types of tofu, vegetables, and sauces are especially perplexing. In contrast, I’ve grown fond of stores with British products. British cuisine is often mocked, but there’s a lot of delicious stuff there. Plus, they have mayonnaise-based salads that I miss here.
I should come up with a system for trying something new. Right now, it’s like a lottery: you have to take a risk and try something unfamiliar, but the chances of it being tasty aren’t always high.
10. The animals I expected to be dangerous 🐊🐍
Singapore is in the tropics, so I expected frequent encounters with dangerous wildlife. Saltwater crocodiles live in Singapore’s coastal and wetland areas, and they can travel through seawater — an alarming thought when you regularly swim at East Coast Park. Luckily, I have never seen one there or anywhere else.
There are also snakes here, including cobras. Once, I actually saw a small (about 1 meter long) black snake while biking through the forest. In the city, there are also many monitor lizards, and they are pretty large! Oh, and let’s not forget the monkeys. I’ve only ever seen one wild monkey in Singapore, and that was from a distance.
It turns out that I greatly exaggerated the danger from large wild animals. No animal or reptile has ever threatened me here. The more practical danger is mosquitoes, which can carry dengue. And, occasionally, wild otters. Yes, the charming Singapore otters travel in groups and can bite when they feel threatened. Do not trust the otters.
11. Repair often means replace 🛠
One oddity I keep noticing in Singapore’s rental market is the preference for recently built apartments, even when their rooms are tiny. Previously occupied units can be cheaper. Someone might describe a condo completed in 2015 as “quite old”. A nine-year-old building: old. Part of the explanation, at least from what I have seen, is that buildings and shared facilities can age very quickly.
I once visited a luxurious condo that looked remarkably tired after only twenty years. People were already discussing whether redevelopment would make more sense than repair. With land values rising, that conversation was not entirely absurd.
I see the same attitude towards appliances. Washing machine broken? Buy another one. Air conditioner leaking? Replace it. Repair does exist in Singapore, of course, but it is often harder or less economical than I expect. The result is that bulky-item disposal areas regularly contain perfectly respectable furniture and appliances, available for the price of carrying them home.
12. Your friends will leave sooner or later 🧳✈️
Many expats I have met in Singapore are educated, capable people who have already lived in several countries and know what they want. They are often quick to make friends because everybody needs to build a social circle from scratch. Local Singaporeans can seem more reserved — understandably, when so many expatriates eventually leave.
Singapore makes impermanence unusually visible. Many homes are leasehold; HDB flats are generally sold on 99-year leases and return to the state when the lease ends. Cars come with a ten-year Certificate of Entitlement. After that, the owner must pay to renew it or deregister the vehicle. Nothing is automatically permanent.
This creates certain difficulties. People come to Singapore easily and leave just as easily. In the five years that I’ve lived here, many of my friends have left, and my social circle constantly changes. The reasons for leaving can vary: some have found better jobs in other countries, some found it too expensive here, and some were fired and had to leave. I also feel that my stay here won’t be permanent, but I don’t know for how long…
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