LONELY PLANET KIDS INTERVIEWS ZARA
Postcard from… Singapore
Interview with Zara Khanna, Founder of Octa, by Imogen Hall
Link to article on Lonely Planet
Nine-year-old Zara Khanna shares why she thinks Singapore is such a good place for kids to visit.
Singapore is the kid-friendliest city in the world! There are parks, playgrounds, awesome sights and incredible food. Here are a few of my favorite places to check out.
Gardens by the Bay has gigantic high-tech domes with jumbo-petaled flowers from every corner of the world. And if you climb up the giant purple flower towers and walk the rope bridge between them, you get an amazing view of the Straits of Malacca with thousands of ships passing through every day.
East Coast Park is a cool beach park with a huge jungle gym. You can also rollerblade endlessly — but watch out for those pesky cobblestones! Where else can you stand in one spot and look east to the Pacific Ocean and west to the Indian Ocean? I also love the island of Sentosa, which has wave pools, Universal Studios and a zillion flavors of ice cream! You also can’t miss the Art & Science Museum, which is shaped like a giant lotus flower. My favorite exhibit is called ‘Future World,’ where you get to play with glowing orbs, wear VR headsets, and dance on glowing light pads.
Is all this talk making you hungry? You came to the right city. Singapore has epic hawker centers, basically food courts that sell street food from China, India, Malaysia, Thailand and beyond. It’s like a buffet where you pay as you go along. There’s so much to eat, but you must try the prawns coated in wasabi sauce and Hainanese chicken rice – my favorite! They serve it to all the visiting presidents.
The only downside I can see in Singapore is that there are no snow days since it’s on the equator! So forget that Crazy Rich Asians movie and go see for yourself!