My old stomping ground

I did something that I had never done before - I ran twice today.

Went with my cousin to Botanic Garden this morning. I picked him up at 8am and when we started running there, it was about 8.25am. The park was full of people, many dog walkers, runners. There were even 2 qigong sessions going on - with the full fluid movements and shouts and all, and someone with a make-believe sword! We did a slow walk/slow jog and covered some 4k. My heart rate was in the "easy" zone and I now know what it is to be on a recovery run. I did not have my camera phone with me and would have been a little shy to have whipped it out because the park also attracts quite a few serious photographers. These are the chaps with the long white lenses; I had seen some of them at Lake Gardens but there are many more over here at Botanic Gardens.

Resisting a roti canai/roti prata breakfast after the run, we had the famous Adam Road nasi lemak instead. There is an urban legend to this nasi lemak stall - the Sultan of Brunei would come all the way here to get some, whenever he is in Singapore. I remarked to my cousin this stall is pretty good but nothing beats the KL version. The nasi lemak stall just outside the KL home does not enjoy the same patronage but would be able to challenge this Adam Road one for taste anytime.

I had been wanting to go back to MacRitchie for sometime. The last planned outing there was aborted. MacRitchie somehow holds a certain allure for me because it was the place I started running many years ago. Till today, I can vividly recall the route, the uneven ground, the hills, the slippery path and all - and the route remained the same today as it was some 20yrs ago. The hills seemed more gentle, and the turn-off at SICC is no longer slippery because it had been sanded over.

Only in Singapore will you get the authorities trucking a ton of sand deep into a nature reserve, just to ensure a 150m uphill strip of earth does not become slippery from usage and rain. I half suspect the strip had even been paved over! No where else in the world would you get such attention to detail, because most people would leave a nature reserve, well, as a nature reserve...letting the trees lie where they had fallen..

The only thing that I found foreign with MacRitchie this time was that the canopy of trees made it extra humid and breathing difficult. I wanted to go easy on the outward leg, which was within the nature reserve itself, and I did. Only when I hit Lornie Road (the return leg) that I picked up speed. I turned in a respectable 25min flat - enough to qualify me for the MR25 club.

Everything about MacRitchie remained the same, right down to the school boys from VS running there Sunday afternoons. But the bit of the park at the end-point of the run has been modernised - new multi-story car park, new makan area. A bit of a shame because that used to be an area for the sprint finish, into a sea of other fellow runners whom had finished earlier (quicker!). I only have my memories of that area now.