We took this at Tanglin Mall earlier that day

After our walk at the Botanic Gardens (see Run Darius, Run!), we took a cab to Paragon along Orchard Road to check out the Christmas lightings in the area.

We actually wanted to find some suitable food for Darius’ dinner but all the restaurants were very crowded with queues long stretching. So we ended up getting some bread from Bread Talk instead.

Due to some miscommunication with Catherine, I took a while before I managed to bring the bread to the hungry Darius, who was already whining constantly in his stroller. As a result, Catherine had prepared milk for him in my absence so as to fill his stomach for that moment. He was drinking eagerly, showing how hungry he was. He must had expended a lot of energy running up and down at the Botanic Gardens earlier. He was very tired too as he dosed off soon after finishing his milk.

While he was sleeping, Catherine and I walked around the mall and found some clothes for Darius from Fox’s Kids. By then, it was already quite late and many shops in the mall were closing.

At this moment, Darius woke up from his slumber and we thought we could still bring him around to watch the lightings. We had earlier thought it was too late and we should head home for his sleep. However, since he had just taken a nap in his stroller, he was probably all perked up and wouldn’t be able to sleep a wink even if we were to head straight for home then.

Stepping out of Paragon, we came across a huge Christmas tree just outside its main entrance. A group of carols was singing while we moved to the side to pose for photos with the tree. Darius was looking a little stunned and confused when we brought him out of the stroller, probably a little overwhelmed by the crowd (yes, there were still a lot of people around even at that time), lights and music all around us.

Letting him walk on the ground was not possible with the pathways all packed with people. He could easily get lost or knocked down by the people walking. As a result, he was constantly being carried in either Catherine’s or my arms. Putting him in the stroller would not be a good idea since he won’t be able to feel the atmosphere of the crowded, Christmas-lit Orchard Road.

As I stood near the road with Darius in my arms, Catherine tried capturing some shots of the lightings and vehicles passing behind us using different settings of the camera. Some of the shots did turn out well though, quite a handful got too blurry too.

Soon after, I spotted a Christmas tree deco along the street and thought of taking a photo with it. The problem was however, the constant passers-by that were walking past the deco, making it a difficult task for a decent photo. Still, Catherine amazingly managed to capture the right moment for this resulting nice photo:

Well-timed shot taken by Catherine

With Catherine pushing the stroller while I carried Darius, we then walked towards the direction of Mandarin Oriental Hotel. It had undergone some upgrading and what was once its main entrance is now known as Mandarin Gallery.

Before this, Darius had been silent and watching his surroundings intently. Seeing that the crowd here was lesser here, I placed him on the ground for him to stretch his limbs and walk. However, he didn’t do so but instead, he turned around to face me with his arms stretched outwards, wanting me to carry him again. Looks like he was cautious about the unfamiliar place and felt safer with us carrying him.

At this point, we felt we had seen enough and were thinking of heading for home. Since the nearest taxi stand that we know of is situated in front of Centrepoint, we started moving towards that direction, with the crowd getting bigger as we moved on.

We passed by the new shopping mall, 313@Somerset and were surprised that the shops in the mall were still opened. They had probably extended their operating hours during this festive period. However, we merely passed by the mall as we were already feeling tired and were not in the exploration mood.

With our arms getting tired, we decided to place Darius back into his stroller while we continued to push on towards Centrepoint. Catherine managed to snap some photos of the nice reindeer decoration in front of the mall when we reached there.

When we looked at the taxi stand however, we could see a long queue waiting. There were also many people outside the queue making calls to book the cab or waiting for their ‘on call’ cabs to arrive.

Looking at this crowd of people and the congested Orchard Road, we believed it would take a long while before we would be able to successfully board a cab. Getting through the cab booking hotline would likely be a problem, and even if we did get through to book a cab, it would probably take some time for it to reach since the road was jammed with traffic.

In the end, we decided to take the MRT back home instead since it was already late for Darius’ sleeping time anyway. As we wondered where in the world is the entrance to Somerset MRT, we noticed a sign that said MRT right in front of the entrance of  the 313@Somerset. No wonder so many people were walking into the building just now! We thought they were still going to the shops inside but probably they were just taking the MRT home. So back we went and took a train home. Fortunately the train was not as crowded as we had expected so we didn’t have problem finding a place to stand through the ride.

All in all, we enjoyed the walk-through with Darius to look at the Christmas Lightings. He was mostly staring hard at the things around him since he had never seen these before. Here’s some more photos that we took to share:

This year's theme focuses on Orbs hanging on a Tree. Along some stretches of road, there were blue ones. And on another stretch, there were pinkish ones.

An interesting sticker on the traffic light stating, "BNE WAS HERE"

Reindeers pulling Santa on sleigh high up on a building (this was zoomed in)

Gigantic Rotating Santa

Finally... Darius Looking Intense through it all, his eyes fixedly, his head turning here and there, trying to absorb the lights, the people, the atmosphere near 11pm!

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