On my three days business trip to Singapore, I found a time to visit the famous Singapore Botanic Gardens which actually seemed to be no problem as the garden opens every day from 5 AM to midnight, but I also wanted to visit the famed National Orchid Garden too and this section only opens till 7 PM, so after meeting I directly went to the park and arrived at 4 PM, a perfect late afternoon time to see the places and stayed in there until 8 PM before my dinner. The first thing I saw was the lovely light gray casted iron gate, a very charming entrance to the park, the park, except orchid garden, was free so no ticket booths or guards around. Inside the garden was full of exotic tropical plants in the very interesting mix landscape of English garden, tropical jungle and modern garden. There are small, lovely lakes, large lawn area with bandstand and palm trees next to a very lush forest like garden. I also saw heritage rubber tree which said to be one of the first group of rubber trees in Southeast Asia, this historical tree is very interesting as rubber plantation industry in this region was a result of this tree and become one of outstanding universal value reason that Singapore used to nominate the garden as World Heritage Site as economic garden.

Another highlight of the garden is orchid; in the garden I saw many kinds of orchid especially in the National Orchid Garden. There is orchid named after royalties like Japanese Emperor, Princess Diana, African Monarchs and also politicians and celebrities like Angela Merkel and Margaret Thatcher! But the most impressive one was large grove of beautiful Vanda Miss Joaquim, Singapore National Flower. The garden also has small cool house with rare carnivorous plants only found in the region, ginger garden, a lot of authurium, curcumas and colorful elephant ear that will easily make gardeners cry out of joy. My overall experience in Singapore Botanic Garden was fine; the garden was lovely but actually quite smaller than I thought. However, I felt that the garden was not exactly of what heritage botanic garden should be! There was nothing like Kew or the one in Padua in terms of old garden. The landscape layout also looks very new, except small colonial landscape around Swan Lake and the bandstand; I felt the garden has been developed and altered to match trends of gardening throughout the years. The botanic garden in Kandy, Sri Lanka is maybe better in term of preserving heritage layout.

I am also not sure with the concept of economic garden that Singapore uses to nominate the place as rubber is not a focal point of the garden anymore, the main plant research in this garden is orchid and curcumas, but both are not economical plant although more profit generates than rubber. The story behind why Singapore chooses this garden as its first World Heritage Site can shed a light to many answers. There are three sites that matched the criteria, Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, colonial old city including the Tiong Bahru Estate, and the Botanic Gardens. It seems that it is a big task to distinguish small Bukit Timah from other forests in Malaysia and Indonesia, and the concern of buffer zone criteria in colonial old city may affect the land development of this small city state, so Botanic Gardens is obviously their single choice. But does Botanic Garden offer the best of Singapore? My answer would be "NO", but since Singapore wants to become "Garden City" and "City in the Garden" so to have botanic garden as a World Heritage Site, as a centerpiece of the island, is maybe an appropriate one, and at least the choice is a more welcomed selection than Sentosa Island or Changi Prison! Anyway, in my opinion, the newly built Garden by the Bay is actually more impressive than Singapore Botanic Gardens and if you have short time in Singapore, Garden by the Bay is the place to go except you are an orchid lover or maybe a World Heritage Site enthusiast!!