Originally, we planned to visit Hort Park at Alexander Road today, but somehow we ended up in Plaza Singapura and Vivo City instead. We have told ourselves that we wish to expose Darius to more natural environment such as parks but without a car, these places will always be inaccesible to us.

Anyway, we took a MRT from Admiralty all the way to Dhoby Ghaut MRT Station, making this the longest trip on the MRT with Darius! He was awake the entire journey but was well-behaved until the Bishan station, when he started to get cranky due to his sleepiness. He’s always cranky when he’s tired, and Catherine seemed to be the only one who can pacify and let him sleep peacefully (my attempts always failed -_-|).

When we finally reached Dhoby Ghaut, it was drizzling and we were glad we got our umbrellas and stroller cover with us. Our first objective upon reaching Plaza Singapura was to change Darius’ diapers and feed him (shopping hardly become our first priority as parents now).

To our dismay, the nursing room available was small and was coupled with one diaper change station. We were queuing up before Catherine went to the female restroom and found a big handicapped cubicle with a changing table. (The cubicle was very clean but impossible to feed Dar unless I sit on the toilet seat)

After changing his diapers, we had to decide on the place to feed him, but we couldn’t find any sitting place in the mall, leaving us no choice but to feed him in the food court again (see Our Trip to Northpoint’s New Wing), which had Darius very distracted during his feed, making the entire feeding tedious for Catherine. To add on to the difficulty, Darius pooped halfway through the feed. She brought him to the sixth floor female restroom and discovered that there’s a changing station in it too with one couch for nursing in a corner of the restroom.  So it was still possible to feed Darius but we must do it in the toilet and Daddy will have to wait outside.

Anyway just opposite the restrooms on the third floor, there was this baby spa by Hwa Xua International, which has been popular amongst parents with newborns. However, we did not know that a branch has been opened in Plaza Singapura too. Their business must have been great.

Curious onlookers onto a helpless baby...

The baby who was swimming in the warm tub looked like he was enjoying it, but what I didn’t like was that the tubs were purposely situated alongside the glass walls along the main corridor. Every passer-by thus looked and commented at the baby and parents.

Kids are very interested in the swimming baby too

Perhaps this would make the parents proud, but I would feel uneasy to look like an exhibit in a museum or animal in the zoo. Still, to the store, it will certainly be free publicity for them.

We left for Vivo City soon after, and was swamped by a huge crowd when we reached there. Once again, we had to feed Darius again (time flies whenever we are outside with Darius). We went to the nursing room on the basement and were faced with a single room again.

Asking for directions, the janitor pointed us to the Play Court on the 2nd floor, which had the main Baby Room located. Following his directions, we reached the place where many children were playing with the water sprouting out from the outlets and found the Baby Room.

We were pleased when we realised there were six breastfeeding cubicles, two couches and four change stations, each equipped with a sink, hand tissues and diaper bin. I had wanted to take photos of the place but decided against it after realising a CCTV was running and monitoring the room. I wouldn’t want to be mistakened as a perverted photographer.

Darius, however, had no appetite and only drank a little milk. Since he had been sleeping on the stroller most of the time, he probably had not expended much energy and thus was not hungry. Not wanting to make the poor Darius stucked in the stroller, Catherine and I took turns to carry him. Nowadays when we go out, we will always make effort to bring him out of the stroller and let him see the surroundings. It saddens us to see him bored and couped up in the stroller.

After a little window shopping, we started to look for a place to settle our dinner, being tired, thirsty and hungry. We wanted to try something special, and after a long walk round Vivo City, we finally settled down at a japanese restaurant called Shin Kushiya.

The restaurant specialises in ‘Kushiya’ (as its name implies), which means ‘grilled skewers’ in japanese. ‘Yakitori’, which many of us should have heard of, represents skewers that comprises of chicken meat. However for Kushiya, other ingredients such as seafood, pork and beef are used.

We didn't manage to take any good photos of the food so we used the photo from the restuarant's website ^^|

We needed to get some main dish down our empty stomaches first so we ordered udon and cha soba, before ordering some Kushiya. I particularly liked two of the skewers: The first is the chicken meatballs dipped in japanese curry sauce. The curry was very tasty, and I told myself that I would return soon to savour its curry rice dishes. The other skewer was made of melted cheese wrapped around a thin slice of pork. It tasted somewhat like the cheese crust of pizzas from pizza hut, but tastier.

We were glad to have dinner at this restaurant and we would definitely return here if we are to visit Vivo City again.

Spirited up again after a good dinner!

Before heading home, we visited Page One, a big bookstore, and bought a CD collection which consisted of 5 discs containing children songs in mandarin. We have always placed priority on teaching Darius the Chinese language first so this was a good find for us (see Language & Reading with Darius).

Overall, it was one tiring trip for the three of us, but quite a fruitful one. Next up, Hort Park! (I hope~ ^^|)

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