Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Singapore: Singapore Zoo & Buddha Tooth Relic Temple

Matty & I spent the third day of our trip at the Singapore Zoo.  The zoo is surrounded by a thick rainforest. It was really lush & beautiful. Macaques & orangutans have 'free reign' of the zoo. You can look up at any time & see them above you. Neat!!
 
This is a mouse deer.
Head of a mouse, body of a deer & about the size of a small dog. Interesting.

 My favorites were the giraffes. They were so beautiful. The Singapore Zoo has certain times of day where visitors can pay $5 to feed different animals: giraffes, elephants, manatees, kangaroos & white rhinos. We arrived just in time to feed the giraffes & I was NOT going to miss out on this opportunity! We were third in line & so excited.



The absolute highlight of my day!
The only sad part was it went by too fast. I would have loved for it to have lasted several minutes.

Matty brought his GoPro camera along & filmed our feeding adventure. So glad he did!☺
They were so stinkin' adorable!!!
 

Giraffe skull
 



These flowers were super soft. So pretty too!

Need a potty break?  I was a little freaked out by this toilet.
Thankfully, the other toilets in the bathroom were 'westernized.'☺
 We were really surprised by the lack of fencing in certain animal habitats. There was really nothing to stop this wallaby from hopping over the fence - or from curious visitors entering the enclosure.

We spent about 5 hours at the zoo. We had planned to do the Night Safari as well, but we were pretty much zoo-ed out at this point.  So we decided to visit Chinatown & the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple.  I read that approximately upwards of $18 million dollars worth of gold was donated by followers around the world for use in this specific temple.

 
 
 
There is a dress code to visit: no shorts, miniskirts or short sleeved shirts.  No problem! Volunteers pass out shawls & sarongs to visitors who don't come properly dressed (such as myself!).☺
 
Finally presentable & able to enter the temple.☺
 
 


Buddha's footprints.

Golden footprint.


Reclining Buddha.


 
The golden stupa that housed the tooth was absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately, no cameras were allowed on the 4th floor at all. Here is a photograph of the stupa that houses the tooth (from the Buddha Tooth Relic website).  It's even more breathtaking in person. The shimmer from the gold was simply amazing.
via Buddha Tooth Relic Temple
The rooftop houses a Buddhist prayer wheel, an orchid garden & 10,000 minature Buddha statues along the walls (10,000!!!!!).




This is a close up of one of the tiny Buddha's.
These were maybe 3" tall.
It was a fascinating (& most spectacular) self-guided tour. When we finally made our way back to the temple entrance, there was a service going on inside. We could see & hear the monks chanting inside. I asked if I could take a video & was told I could. Listen to the chanting - it's very interesting!

1 comment:

Chris and Sarah said...

1. SO MUCH GOLD! Shiny! Awesome.
2. Nice sarong.
3. Creepy toilet.
4. I love that you could feed the giraffe! It costs $8 to give a giraffe one piece of romaine lettuce at the Santa Barbara Zoo, and we've always been too cheap to participate.
5. Love all your pics!
6. Bye!