Buying a new cell phone in Singapore

Today I took my friend Fauzi’s advice and went to Toa Payoh to look at cell phones. I’m not a gadget person and don’t care about ringtones, video clips or playing games. For me its purely a device to save time.

Toa Payoh is an area of cheap housing, in high rise blocks, I know because I was here in 1984. [Short story: Arriving in Singapore late at night by bus from Malaysia, I was an inexperienced backpacker alone in a totally new environment. Still I had my tent and was determined to use it. Walking past a downtown park around midnight looking for a good spot to plant the thing, a local Indian, Mr Balasubramanian, told me it was impossible to camp in Singapore, due to the local laws and lack of space. Impossbile is not a word in my vocabulary, so I told him not to worry, I’d keep looking. Realizing I’d be arrested, he invited me to stay at his house in Toa Payoh. Mr. Balasubramanian was a slim fellow, but his wife was more than large. Sprawled out on their double bed in his high rise apartment (I still remember the address, Lorong 6, Blk 84, floor 12), she welcomed me and her husband declared the bed was to be mine, they offering to take the floor. Of course I couldn’t allow this and spread out on the living room for the next 3 days. Finally he dropped me off at the ferry terminal for Sentosa island, where I camped illegally in the jungle for a week, (another story).]

Okay so Toa Payoh is aplce with a local market area of small shops selling the usual array of gadgets and things that people want, including electrical bits and pieces. In short I needed a phone with good coverage worldwide, a camera, internet access and a built in GPS. Staff a one small shop recommended a Nokia Navigator. The guy helped install my old SIM card, load the address book, install a new 2GB memory card, case etc. Total cost including Sing tax was $785 Sing (US$515), a chunk of which I’ll get back at the airport by showing the Customs I’m leaving with the device. So far the thing seems to works pretty good, just have to remember to pick it up everytime I put it down and try not to drop it in the toilet.

You can get to Toa Payoh very easily from anywhere in Singapore by using the MRT and getting of at Toa Payoh station.