Family Day - Hippo Bus Tour

Saturday, 24th May 2008 has been branded Singapore's inaugural National Family Day. As part of the programme to encourage families in Singapore to eat and spend time together, there have been free tickets given for a number of outdoor rides and other assortment of activities. My elder SIL had "won" 7 tickets to ride on the Hippo Bus Tour and together with my PILs and us, we have been invited to join them for the tour too to fully utilise all the tickets.

Actually, there were 8 adults and 1 toddler (Faith rides for free) in total. I guess it being a family day and all, the organisers were generous to allow all of us up the bus even though technically, Adrian was scheduled to "stand down" if our PILs were to join the bus tour :)

The scheduled departure was for the 1.30 pm bus. Our little family of 3 and my PIL went a little earlier so that we could feed Faith her lunch, as well as grab ours before the boarding time. The ACES family left even earlier to take the train and have lunch at Millennia (or was it Marina Square?) before we all rendezvous together at the departure point i.e. Singapore Flyer.

It must be the first time that the building of Singapore Flyer had seen so many people! There were scores of families there for the free Singapore Flyer rides, as well as folks departing on the Hippo Bus. At the ground floor of the ticketing booths, it was a carnival-like festive feeling with a few clown-like characters walking on stilts, balloon sculpturing, face-painting etc. Anders was rather frightened by the guys in stilts cos when they walked near him, he burst in tears and was cowering by the wall in fright. Poor boy :(

There wasn't really much of a queue for the Hippo Bus Tour. We managed to squeeze on board the bus that was departing. However, the family had to split up as we were the last group to board. The ACES family headed up to the open-air top deck, or what is known as the "topless" part of the double-decker bus. My FIL and I sat at the very last row of the lower deck, with Faith choosing now and then to alternate between the both of us to carry her. My MIL was sitting a few rows ahead of us and there was only standing room for Louis.

Halfway through the ride, Anthea came down to join us cos she said it was sweltering up on the upper deck. Indeed, the weather was again blistering yesterday afternoon and she said that even though she was sitting on her cap, the seats have been heated up from the noon-day sun. Hence, her decision to seek refuge from the air-conditioned deck below :)

Since there wasn't already any seat left, Anthea ended up sitting on my lap while my FIL carried Faith. Halfway through, Faith decided that she wanted to sit on my lap too. So, we had Anthea hug Faith on her lap, while Anthea sat on mine :)

The bus ride was over in about thirty (30) minutes. The bus toured mainly around the Suntec and City Hall area, covering places like the Padang, old and new Supreme Court, National Library, Suntec City Mall and the Fountain of Wealth, Raffles Hotel etc.

An anecdote that the bus commentator shared about the Raffles Hotel, other than the fact that the Singapore Sling was concocted at this famous landmark was about Michael Jackson. A few years ago when Michael Jackson had a concert in Singapore and booked most of the hotel rooms for himself and his crew, he even wanted to book the entire Singapore Zoo for himself.

However, the decision of the government was that it was a tourist location opened to the public and politely declined him. As a goodwill gesture, they had the late Ah Meng (another famous orang utan) to have breakfast with him instead at the hotel :) This was actually the origin of the Breakfast with Ah Meng that subsequently became a highlight in the Singapore Zoo.

I couldn't really remember much of the rest cos I was busy trying to entertain Faith on the trip, not that she needed much distracting really. This was her first time on board a bus and she was rather curious about the people and her surroundings.

All too soon, the tour ended and we were back at the coach bay at the Singapore Flyer. On alighting, we were told to collect our goody bags at the collection centre. My MIL and SIL went together to collect the bags while we loitered around the landing area. Anthea saw a booth where they were doing face-painting and wanted to do it. Unfortunately, they were finishing up the last few paintings for kids and we were told to return at 2.30 pm for the next round of face-painting.

We decided to join my MIL and SIL and headed towards the collection centre. There, we saw yet another booth with face-painting. Even though the guy next to the artist doing the painting said they were done for the current shift, my MIL gamely walked up with Anthea in tow and asked the artist after she was done with her last charge if she could do just one more. She was nice and willingly obliged.

And so, Anthea had her forearms painted with flowers by the artist and she was rather pleased with the final result. She was telling me that the flowers were very pretty as they were dusted with some glittering paint as well.

After her hand-painting, we parted ways. The ACES family headed back towards the MRT to take a train home while we also headed home with Faith.