Singapore Housing - Dakota Crescent

Dakota Crescent is an old estate located at the east side of Singapore, opposite of Old Airport Road Food Center. 

This is a quiet estate. Some of the blocks are 6 levels high while others 3 levels high. 

These units come with a balcony. It is nice to have a balcony.

Old door, those days postman slot the mail / letter into the small opening at the bottom of the door.

I never see this type of OLD lift before. Where to press for the lift? Take a closer look, a small black button at the side.

The interior has those fluorescent lights in “cage”. Nowadays the light tubes are hidden behind translucent shade.

Ventilation

The words beside the buttons had faded.

It stops at level 1, 3 and 6. I decided to take lift up to experience it. Rum Rum Rum, the door closed, kong kong kong the lift moved up to level 3. The lift jerked, I thought I was stuck in the lift. Then it went rum rum rum door opened. I did not dare to take the lift down, so I walked down the stairs. I laughed at myself for lack of guts.

When I step out of the lift this cat gave me a scare, sat on the louvered window plank, staring at me.

More cats.

 

This type of playground used to be very common 20 years ago. Built with tiles, stone and cement. The base of the playground contained sand. Due to hygiene and safety reasons, one by one this type of playgrounds is replaced by the modern one – metal, high quality plastic, bright in colors, rubber flooring. Goodbye to the Singapore Playground, an icon of Singapore.

This vintage provision shop has been there since 1959. In the past, we would go to this type of provision shop to buy our candies and grocery. Uncle Lin, 80plus, the owner of the provision shop. He said the business gets so much tougher nowadays as a lot of people have moved out from that estate. He heard the government is going to increase his rental, which will make the situation worse.  

Nice looking staircase infront of the provision shop.

Railway – The Yard @ Kampong Bahru

When the government announced the termination of train services, I made a trip down to The Yard at Kampong Bahru. The Yard was not as glamorous as Tanjong Pagar Station, which had marble statutes, art-deco, neo-classical and local styles of design.

It was my 1st time walking on The Yard to take a close look at the railway tracks, trains and workshop. 

Tracks

Stopper - When you see this from afar, you better stop the train as there is no more track ahead.

Turner - They used this to turn the train head direction.

Trains and spare parts

Workshop - All the repairs and maintenances were carried out here.

 

It's surrounding - Spottiswoode Estate, Duxton Estate, Indian Temple.

The Yard served an important role as the train stopped by for repair before starting a long journey up Malaysia. The Yard is no longer there. Goodbye.

Nana Green Tea

It offers variety of green tea drinks and desserts for you to indulge.

Thin Matcha with Green Tea Soft Serve - This glass of Thin Matcha with soft serve ice cream was customized. In the menu, Thin Matcha is only sold with vanilla soft serve float, we wanted to change the vanilla to green tea flavor as they do sell green tea soft serve in a takeaway cone. Store Manager, Haru, graciously agreed to replace the vanilla with green tea soft serve.

Salmon Carpaccio – Ordered without salad dressing. The salmon is thick, fresh and sweet. At SGD8.80 for 8 slices of salmon, it is very value for money.

Salmon Don – Ordered without mayonnaise. The salmon tasted great, same as Salmon Carpaccio.

For SGD14.80 and with the same amount of salmon, this would mean that I paid SGD6.00 more for the rice and a bowl of miso soup. Overall it was still nice.

Waka Tama Udon – Looked slightly different from the menu. In the menu, the seaweed covers the whole top surface, cannot see through the layer. While this one, the seaweed is sparingly scattered on top of the soup and you can see the Udon beneath it.  We expected to get what was like in the photo.