Singapore Expats

1st of all .. it's another 4ish months to end of 2014. (YaY!!, i've survived 8 months in sg )

my company has given me a choice to change my housing location or stay put at the current one which is Harbourfront for Yr 2015.

is Holland Village a nice place to venture?

It's entirely up to your preferences. Both places are comparable as of the basic infrastructure and its density with the main differences for HV:
- more eating/drinking places of better ambience (as of mine perception)
- closer to the downtown area if you like to be there frequently for some reason

I stay as far away from HV as possible. Too many pretentious people there for my liking. But each to their own. Others swear by it.

sundaymorningstaple wrote:I stay as far away from HV as possible. Too many pretentious people there for my liking. But each to their own. Others swear by it.

Tend to agree. I wouldn't choose to go unless say I got a tip to something genuinely nice there (a new restaurant, or specialist food shop stocking things I like etc). That said, I haven't been for 1+ years.

@C-P. It sounds like HV doesn't offer enough to have tempted you to visit either. If that is so why would you want to pay 'the D10 premium' to live there?

Not sure about the pretentious people, I don't recall interacting with many of this sort and I lived there for 3 years. It is probably a different thing if you visit and a different if you live. HV is a conveniently located place with some nice dining spots, lots of greenery around, frankly, we liked it a lot. We lived a bit off HV, in the Holland Hill area.

Relative perceptions?

I live in the suburbs, and work from home. To me the 'scene' and people in HV are arguably pretentious. The 'shouty' displays of wealth, and so on...

Now, if I still lived in D9, and still worked on a bank's trading floor, well, I'd probably feel completely and most at home amongst that kind of crowd.




--- even hooking up with you guys last time down at Boat Quay was quite a 'warp' for me in a similar respect. I'm quite unused to the crowds, the glitz/glam, the 'public displays of wealth and ego', AND also the hordes of tourists. This was amongst the crowds, NOT at our table!

In a way it was like 'Oh yeah, there are lots of white people in this country - and, ah the shouty expat-$ crowd that I used to be part of long ago (reminisce briefly)... and, oh look, lots of tourists looking lost and a bit kinda dazed in a way... )

We used to live for 7y in CCK before moving to HV and now we live in Bukit Batok and I don't really feel it. I mean, Singapore for me is just full of pretentious people so maybe I chose to filter them out and am not bothered any longer? It's a background noise. Actually I found pretentious people more common in the "cheaper", higher end places. What varies is the ethnicity.

Also HV is not crowded at all. I mean the area, not the shopping mall. You cross Queensway and all the way down to the Orchard Rd is a sort of peaceful enclave. Dempsey used to be a very nice spot too but in recent years got overpopular.

It's handy for western groceries, socializing and every day chores like banking. I don't notice a pretentious thing but I'm not looking for one, it's not somewhere I go to people watch.

thanks for the heads-up

what draws me to HV is its quaint n quirky surroundings. (somehow it reminds me of notting hill in west london).

Hannieroo wrote: I don't notice a pretentious thing but I'm not looking for one, it's not somewhere I go to people watch.

I don't go to new/alt districts looking for other than a good night out, and F+B with wife +/or friends. But when I visit different areas I do notice the demographic and the vibe, and I think one naturally associates the two.

I don't go anywhere aiming to 'people watch', but the flipside is like suggesting you go to North Korea, and make no observations upon the people you encounter. [I think ]

However...

chris_pilgrim wrote:thanks for the heads-up
what draws me to HV is its quaint n quirky surroundings. (somehow it reminds me of notting hill in west london).

... on the flipside...

Well Notting Hill is about as much a home I have as anywhere (my UK base has been there 20+ years now, yes, from way way way before that film was even a dream, and it was still a very rough area), and I partially follow the analogy.
I can go down Portobello Road, get my veg from the market, visit Mr. Christians the deli, get a sausage bun from Mr. Tasty, and just completely blank out the poseurs and tourists.

In/out to niche outlets I know and value, and who else is there doesn't matter. That said I would hate to live on Portobello Road! [Curiously that chick that starred in the X-files bought and tarted up a big flat right at the really hard-boiled end of PRd, AND lived there for some time - talk about brave/gritty!, esp. as she had a pre-teen daughter at the time... a bit like Hugh Grant buying a renovation job in the deep Bronx/Pelhams or something ... ??].

chris_pilgrim wrote:thanks for the heads-up

what draws me to HV is its quaint n quirky surroundings. (somehow it reminds me of notting hill in west london).

I agree but I'd not live near either by choice.

PNGMK wrote:I agree but I'd not live near either by choice.

Know Notting Hill well do you ?

JR8 wrote:I can go down Portobello Road, get my veg from the market, visit Mr. Christians the deli, get a sausage bun from Mr. Tasty, and just completely blank out the poseurs and tourists.

you forgot Gail's !! don't you miss the mixed olive sourdough?!

JR8 wrote:

PNGMK wrote:I agree but I'd not live near either by choice.

Know Notting Hill well do you ?

My ex-SO, who is not from the UK, has lived there since we broke up, so NH is not a fond memory for me

chris_pilgrim wrote:

JR8 wrote:I can go down Portobello Road, get my veg from the market, visit Mr. Christians the deli, get a sausage bun from Mr. Tasty, and just completely blank out the poseurs and tourists.

you forgot Gail's !! don't you miss the mixed olive sourdough?!

weird, that used to be some huge pop-art gallery... that must have failed in recent years.

As I recall there's a super-posh (so no need to be embarrassed, in an open, posh kinda way) sex shop a couple of doors along, Myla or something? selling posh hand made 'intruders'.... oh yah, I say, hand-sculpted Florentine glass you know, oh yah, oh yah, oh yah!!