Sultan Mosque; Kampong Glam; Asian Civilizations Museum

This was another afternoon that didn’t quite go according to my plan. I intended to visit the Sultan Mosque and the nearby Malay Heritage Centre. and then take a 40-minute Singapore River cruise.

It didn’t work out that way. I did visit the Sultan Mosque, but when I walked the half block or so to the Malay Heritage Centre I found nothing there but a construction fence.

I checked Google Maps again, this time looking at the information it provided rather than just having it show me where the centre is. Google told me the centre is temporarily closed.

Then I found the website for the Malay Heritage Centre. It told me it’s undergoing some major reconstruction and will reopen in 2026. It’s now November 2024. I don’t think I can stick around and wait for that.

Having some time to spare, I walked around the Kampong Glam District, which contains the Sultan Mosque and the erstwhile Malay Heritage Centre. (Kampong Glam is also beside Little India, where I was this morning.)

Fair enough. After spending some time there I started walking to the nearest quay where I could get the river cruise. Fortunately, I didn’t buy a ticket in advance.

I hadn’t walked far when the sky turned ominously dark. Then, there was a bolt of lightning followed shortly by a loud clap of thunder. Curiously, it wasn’t raining at that point. But the rain only waited a few minutes before making its presence felt. Foolishly, I’d left my umbrella at the hotel when I left this morning. It’s a trusty umbrella, but not trusty enough to remind me to take it if there’s any threat of rain.

I was able to duck into a mall before the deluge arrived. I hoped to wait it out, but the skies looked like I wasn’t going to catch a break. The weather forecast confirmed that. (Although, precipitation forecasts here aren’t reliable. They almost always say it’s going to rain, but it has rained only a couple of times while I’ve been here. I guess the theory is that if they predict rain often enough, eventually they’ll be right.)

So I decided to scrap the river cruise and look for something indoors. The Asian Civilizations Museum was on my list of things to do on this trip. Despite it being a little over a 20-minute walk from where I was, there was nothing indoors that was anywhere near the top of my list that was any closer.

I took the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit, which in other cities would be called a subway or metro) a few times on the day I went to the Singapore Botanic Garden. It’s quite simple to use. You can use a credit card or Apple Pay to tap on the entry and exit gates. So you don’t have to buy a ticket or pass. And Google Maps is quite good about telling me where to get on, off, and transfer.

There were two different MRT stations for different lines on either side of the mall I was in. But taking just the MRT, I would have had a fairly long walk on the other end anyway. I could have cut down the walk in the rain if I took the bus, rather than the MRT, and I think you can tap on them as well with Apple Pay or a credit card. But I would have had to transfer between two buses and there still would have been something of a walk in the rain on the other end.

Here’s the thing about Singapore, though. Most buildings have either porticos or canopies to shelter people from the rain. So I decided to walk all the way. I waited until the rain got a little lighter, and made as close to a mad dash as a man my age can achieve to the next building with a portico or canopy. If it started raining hard again I waited there until it eased. Following that process, I managed to get to the museum without getting thoroughly soaked.

Sultan Mosque

The Sultan Mosque, which is the largest mosque in Singapore, is very handsome from the outside. There’s a large, bulbous, gold-coloured dome on top of the white, with tan-coloured trim building. And there are some modestly attractive minarets poking up from its corners.

I went to the visitors’ entrance and, adhering to the sign forbidding footwear inside or even on the steps into the mosque, I removed my shoes and placed them in the spot set aside for them. There was also a sign with iconography indicating that short shorts were not allowed. I had shorts on, but they extended to about halfway down my knees. I figured they’d be okay.

I went in, got as far as heathen men are allowed to go (I don’t think women, heathen or not, are even allowed there), looked inside, and snapped a picture. At that point, someone came up to me and politely told me that my knees had to be fully covered. He pointed to where the mosque provides some long cloth that I could wrap around me to cover my knees. Oops.

By that point, I’d already gotten as far as they let non-Muslims go and had taken a photo, so I just went outside, put on my shoes, and left.

From the vantage point I did achieve, I could see that, inside, the Sultan Mosque is a large, open room, with a nice patterned rug. The room’s walls and ceiling are mostly white, with some wood trim. There are also green ribs supporting the ceiling.

Kampong Glam

As I said, the Sultan Mosque is in the Kampong Glam neighbourhood, so I didn’t so much have to walk there from the Sultan Mosque, as just walk around. Compared to Little India, where I was this morning, most of the buildings in Kampong Glam are much more prim and more brightly coloured.

Again compared to Little India, the neighbourhood feels considerably more refined. If I had to label it, I’d say it has significantly less character, but much more charm, if that makes any sense. If it doesn’t make any sense then, well, I’m at a loss to paint a better prose picture of it. Sorry.

There’s one particularly charming lane in the Kampong Glam neighbourhood. It’s called Haji Lane. It is a fully pedestrianized, narrow shopping street. The stores on Haji Lane are somewhat more upscale than the ones in Little India, but they’re still nowhere near high-end.

I’m glad I spent a little time in Kampong Glam, it’s, if you’ll pardon the redundancy, charming. If you won’t pardon the redundancy, then find your own damn word, dammit.

Asian Civilizations Museum

The Asian Civilizations Museum is a Goldilocks museum. By that I mean, it’s not too big and not too small, but just the right size. Having said that, your idea of the ideal museum size may differ from mine.

Its exhibits are spread over three floors, but the top floor exhibit space seems smaller than the lower two floors. I don’t think the floor itself is any smaller than the other two. I don’t know what they do with the rest of the space up there. Maybe it’s for coming attractions. Or maybe I’m just wrong about it being smaller.

The galleries on the first floor of the Asian Civilizations Museum focus on trade within Asia and between Asia and the Middle East over the ages. There are lots of artifacts of ceramics, earthenware, pottery, intricately decorated cabinets, and a few art and other pieces. Trade during the period covered by the museum was primarily maritime and some of the artifacts on display were recovered from shipwrecks.

The galleries with permanent exhibits on the second floor present the various religions of Asia. On display are old religious statues, art and other religion-related items.

The top floor displays Asian fashion, jewelry and ceramics.

Some of the space on the second floor was devoted to a temporary exhibit titled, “Pagoda Odyssey: From San Francisco to Shanghai.”

In 1915, San Francisco, California hosted a Pan Pacific International Exhibition. The Chinese section of one of the buildings at the exposition displayed 84 replicas of iconic Chinese pagodas that existed in real life. They were carved in teakwood to be exact 1:50 scale models of the real thing.

After the exhibition ended, the pagoda models were removed from general view, unseen by the public until now. The Pagoda Odyssey at the Asian Civilizations Museum puts them back on public display for the duration of the temporary exhibition, from May 31, 2024, to June 1, 2025.

And so concluded my day’s activities. Despite the rain and unexpected alterations to my planned itinerary, It was not a bad afternoon, I’d say.