Screaming at an Arcade

Ash and Steve live on the west coast of Singapore, very far away from us (as "far away" goes in Singapore), so she asked us to buy a book from a specific bookstore at Star Vista. Apparently a church owns that whole mall (or a big part of it) so the bookstore only had that one location. Since Ash and Steve have been so kind to us we of course went there. We planned to be super-efficient and go in and out within a few minutes, but when arriving at Buona Vista, a station we know inside and out, we went the wrong way twice. At least be bought the book and sent many photos to Ash to show how good we had been, we love patting ourselves on the back. Then we travelled on towards Bugis.

Ash and Steve were having dinner at a hotel buffet since they had vouchers for free dinner. John and I wanted to join but changed our mind when we saw that it was sixty dollars per person. Instead we went to Bugis+ and ate at a place called Poulet. Both John and I had looked it up online on different occasions and so we thought this was a good idea. It was not. Within twenty five minutes we had looked through the menu, ordered, gotten our food, eaten our food, waitress removed our plates and we paid. It was such a disappointment! The menu never told me that my chicken leg would lay in a very weak tasting soup. When I read potato I expected a small pile of potatoes - I got one fourth of a potato. The chicken was easy to eat, fell apart under my fork but did not taste much. John had half a chicken that came in a bland and watery sauce that had little taste. To that we had mashed potatoes but it tasted a lot like instant mash. This very small meal, that left us hungrier than we were when we got there, costed around forty dollars. It was overpriced and overrated. I am so pissed at this restaurant that I will definitely find as many places I can to review it and give it a honest bad review. Just you wait...

Since we were not the least full we went next door to WingZone and ordered some wings and fries. It was good wings. Not the best I have ever had but I think that depends on what you are looking for in wings. They were crispy and had a lot of sauce on them, so they were made to get you all dirty around the mouth and fingers. What was interesting were the two screens showing a slideshow of other people eating wings and holding up signs with what spiciness level they were eating. We did not understand why we should look at it while eating.

Soon after we were done we found Ash and Steve, who had finished their buffet and walked over to Bugis+. Ash led the way to the Bugis Junction's arcade. It was called Virtualand. It was my first time at an arcade so I was very excited. First impression - very loud. Ash impressed us with explaining how it worked. We paid to get a card containing hundred and fifty something credits which we would use to play the games. John found a shooting game he wanted to start with and so I picked up the other gun. He then looks at me and says he wants to play with Steve. I hand the gun over and walked over to stand by Ash. We look at them play for a very short time before going to find our own machine to play on. We had fun at our first game - throwing balls into a basket and earning points. We laughed a lot.

During the hours we spent in the arcade the guys played their games, Ash and I played ours. We walked between each other to get the card since all four shared the credits. Ash and I found a scary 3D game which we enjoyed, screaming and jumping, so we wanted the guys to play. They were very chill with it and did not seem to understand it at all. One game that particularly felt good to play was Dance Dance Revolution. You stand on a platform with four arrows and you dance to music while hitting the right arrow showed on the screen. I got really into it and jumped around and got sweaty. I had the revelation that I lived in Asia, I could feel it. Another game that was interesting was Mario racing where you sit in racing chairs and have an actual steering wheel. I tried one round then suddenly I felt motion sick and had to stop. The three of them raced without me but I was a very good supporter!

Half past eleven we were running out of credits and we all felt like it was time to leave. With the last few credits we tried those grab-a-price-machine and even though I grabbed one at the first try it did not fall down correctly... I call them corrupted, since I clearly should have gotten that cheap plastic ball with a small insignificant figure inside. We went outside and felt the silence of the midnight street pressing in on us. Fresh air felt good and we strolled down the street looking for a place to have some beers. Most places we passed were closing though and so we made a fine little loop until we were back where we started. It was past midnight and we decided to split and go home. Ash had work in the morning and I had a headache creeping up on me. Before ordering cabs though we sat at a street corner talking for half an hour.

It was an interesting day and I enjoyed being at an arcade for the first time. The loud noise is not understandable for me but it was a load of fun! I want to go back soon and leave with a price from one of those machines. Stupid machines... I should have gotten that ball!