Singapore/Balestier

Balestier, Newton, Novena and Toa Payoh are neighbourhoods in central Singapore. Strung along the North-South Line just north of Orchard Road, these four rather dissimilar districts serve to absorb Singapore's urban sprawl and house its inhabitants. None are particularly attractive from a tourist's point of view, but they are popular for short and longer-term stays in Singapore &mdash; quiet and reasonably priced, but close enough to be convenient.

Understand


Balestier offers one of Singapore's largest clusters of cheap hotels, second only to Geylang. As you might guess, here too the main customers are patrons of the nearby brothels and gambling dens, although they maintain a very low profile and this isn't really a cause for concern.

Newton and Novena are rapidly gentrifying suburbs just north of the city, housing a significant expat population and services geared to them. Novena is a medical tourism hotspot with many hospitals and hotels to cater to visitors. Just one MRT stop further north, though, is the canonical Singapore heartland suburb of Toa Payoh (pron. "Twa(r) Pah-yoh"), housing well over 100,000 Singaporeans in HDB housing blocks.

Get in


Newton, Novena and Toa Payoh are easily accessed on the North-South MRT Line. Balestier does not have convenient access by MRT, although it's possible to hike over from Toa Payoh or Novena stations (10-15 minutes). However, there are quite a few bus services along Balestier Rd, with the most useful ones being SBS 145 to Bugis, City Hall, Boat Quay and Chinatown, 130 to Bugis and City Hall, and 124 to Orchard Road and City Hall.

See
Toa Payoh has no sights as such, but it's an interesting example of the elusive "real Singapore". Just take the MRT to the station and walk around the vast sprawl of Toa Payoh Central, much of which is taken up by an outdoor shopping arcade filled with little neighborhood shops and places to eat.



The Balestier area has two sights of minor interest:



Buy
Most of Balestier's shops &mdash; over 40 at last count &mdash; are devoted to selling light fixtures and other interior decoration items. Unless you want to surprise the folks back home with a lovely Singaporean toilet bowl, it's probably best to head to other shopping centers instead, particularly since Orchard Road is one or two MRT stops away. Both Novena and Toa Payoh have large shopping centers (but not very interesting) around their MRT stations.



Eat
Food around here is cheap and plentiful.



Balestier is locally famous for two products: the flaky bean jam pastry tau sar piah, and the pork rib soup bak kut teh. Thanks to the crowd they serve, most restaurants in Balestier are open until the wee hours.