🇸🇬 Singapore Part 2 - Visa, Money, Packing & the Final Countdown

🇸🇬 Singapore Part 2 - Visa, Money, Packing & the Final Countdown

In Part 1 - How I Planned a Solo Singapore Trip Under ₹60,000, I had done the fun part.

The flights were booked.

The train from Mangalore to Chennai was booked.

I had found a hostel in Chinatown.

I had a rough itinerary.

And somehow, the numbers suggested that my ₹60,000 Singapore challenge might actually work.

But booking an international trip and actually being ready for one are two completely different things.

Now came the paperwork.

The Singapore visa.

Bank statements.

Forex.

Cards.

Travel documents.

SG Arrival Card.

Packing.

And, for some reason, a surprisingly long investigation into whether my MacBook charger would work in Singapore.

The trip was booked.

Now I had to get ready for it.

First Challenge: The Singapore Visa

The visa was probably the part I thought about the most before travelling.

Unlike destinations where you can simply arrive and get a visa, Singapore required me to sort this out before the trip.

I applied through United Visa Service in Bengaluru.

The visa fee came to around:

₹3,684

The application itself wasn't the scary part.

The documentation was.

Passport.

Photographs.

Flight bookings.

Accommodation details.

Employment documents.

Bank statements.

And proof that I had enough money to support the trip.

I didn't want a missing document or some silly mistake to create a problem after I had already booked everything.

So I prepared a proper file containing my travel documents.

For once, being slightly obsessive about documentation was useful.

The ₹1 Lakh Question

One of the things I was advised during the visa process was to maintain a healthy closing balance.

The suggestion I received was to show around ₹1 lakh or more.

That created an interesting situation.

My actual Singapore budget was ₹60,000.

But for the visa, I also needed to demonstrate that I was financially capable of supporting the trip.

I had accounts with Bank of Baroda and HDFC, so I planned the statements accordingly and made sure my finances and supporting documents were clear.

This is one of those parts of international travel nobody really puts in the Instagram photos.

You see:

“Singapore 🇸🇬✈️”

You don't see:

“Please find attached my last six months of bank statements.”

😂

And Then the Visa Arrived

There are certain documents that completely change how real a trip feels.

The flight booking was one.

The visa was another.

Until the visa was approved, Singapore still had a tiny asterisk next to it in my head.

Once that was sorted, the trip suddenly felt much more certain.

I wasn't just planning Singapore anymore.

I was going to Singapore.

And now I could start worrying about entirely different things.

Like money.

How Much Singapore Dollar Should I Carry?

Singapore is extremely card-friendly.

So I didn't want to carry a huge amount of cash.

At the same time, travelling internationally with absolutely no local currency didn't feel like a brilliant idea either.

My plan was to carry roughly:

S$100–150 in cash

That would give me enough for smaller purchases, food stalls or situations where cash was simply easier.

For everything else, I wanted to use a card.

Which brought me to another part of the preparation.

Enter the Niyo Global Card

Foreign exchange fees can quietly destroy a travel budget.

A ₹200 purchase doesn't feel very different after a small markup.

Repeat that dozens of times and suddenly you've donated a decent amount of your travel budget to banking fees.

So before Singapore, I got a Niyo Global Visa card.

The card arrived well before the trip, giving me enough time to set everything up rather than figuring it out at the airport.

My basic money strategy became:

Cash → small/random expenses

Card → most normal purchases

And then I would track what I was spending.

At least, that was the plan.

Singapore would later test the tracking what I was spending part quite aggressively.

Learning to Think in Singapore Dollars

Before travelling, S$5 sounds small.

It's just five dollars.

Then you convert it.

At roughly ₹75 for one Singapore dollar:

S$5 ≈ ₹375

Suddenly that snack feels slightly different.

S$10?

Around ₹750.

S$20?

Around ₹1,500.

Singapore dollars have this wonderful ability to make you feel financially comfortable until you convert them into rupees.

So before the trip, I started mentally converting prices.

That habit became extremely useful once I arrived.

It also became extremely annoying.

Because eventually I couldn't look at anything without my brain automatically multiplying it by approximately 75.

Internet Was Another Question

Being without mobile data in another country wasn't something I wanted to experiment with.

Google Maps alone was going to be essential.

I needed directions.

MRT information.

Places to eat.

Opening hours.

Bookings.

Messages.

And the occasional emergency search for:

“How do I get back to Chinatown from here?”

I looked into SIM and connectivity options before travelling.

Changi Airport also had Wi-Fi, which meant I wouldn't be completely disconnected immediately after landing.

That was reassuring because my flight was arriving at around 10:50 PM.

The last thing I wanted was to land close to midnight with no internet and start navigating Singapore entirely through confidence and bad decisions.

Then Came the Great Charger Problem

Of all the things I expected to research before an international trip, this was not high on the list.

Singapore uses the Type G power socket.

My MacBook charger?

Two round pins.

Excellent.

For a while, I wondered whether I could survive using USB-C charging points without buying an adapter.

Technically, maybe.

Practically?

I didn't want to arrive in Singapore and discover that my entire charging strategy depended on finding the correct USB-C socket every night.

So I eventually ordered a travel adapter.

It arrived before the trip.

Tiny problem solved.

But this became one of those travel lessons:

You can have your visa, passport, flight and hotel completely sorted...

…and still get defeated by a wall socket.

The Suitcase Arrived

Another small milestone was getting my suitcase.

When it arrived, I immediately checked the two things that mattered:

Was it lightweight?

Yes.

Were the dimensions suitable?

Yes.

Perfect.

I wasn't planning to take half my house to Singapore.

Six days didn't require six months' worth of luggage.

I wanted to keep things manageable because I already had multiple stages of travel:

Mangalore → Chennai → Airport → Singapore → Chinatown

Dragging an unnecessarily heavy suitcase through all of that would have been completely self-inflicted suffering.

The Travel Document File

As departure got closer, I started putting everything important into one physical file.

Passport.

Visa.

Flight details.

Hostel booking.

Employment letter.

Financial documents.

Forex-related documents.

Other supporting travel papers.

Some of those documents would probably never be asked for.

That wasn't the point.

International travel is one of those situations where I'd rather carry five documents I don't need than discover I'm missing the one document someone suddenly wants.

I also kept digital copies.

Because losing one piece of paper shouldn't be allowed to destroy an entire trip.

Two Weeks to Go

This was when the countdown really started.

Until then, Singapore had always felt far away.

Then suddenly:

Two weeks.

I started going through everything again.

Flights? ✓

Train? ✓

Hostel? ✓

Visa? ✓

Card? ✓

Forex? ✓

Suitcase? ✓

Adapter? On the way.

Documents? ✓

It was happening.

11 Days.

Every few days, the countdown became more exciting.

At 11 days, I was still thinking about logistics.

What else should I pack?

Would there be Wi-Fi at the airport?

How much cash should I carry?

Do I need anything else for immigration?

What charging ports would I find?

Which places should I move around in the itinerary?

These weren't big problems anymore.

They were the small details you obsess over because the big things are already done.

8 Days.

On 31 August, I initially thought:

7 DAYS TO GO!

Then realised my mathematics had become slightly too excited.

It was eight.

😂

Still.

Eight days until I left Mangalore.

At that point, Singapore stopped feeling like something happening next month.

It was happening next week.

The SG Arrival Card

One final requirement was the SG Arrival Card.

Unlike the visa, this had to be handled close to arrival because it could only be submitted within the permitted window before entering Singapore.

So this wasn't something I could complete months in advance and forget about.

I kept it on the final checklist.

Passport.

Visa.

Flight.

Accommodation.

SG Arrival Card.

It was one of the last pieces before departure.

Packing for Six Days

I wanted the packing to stay simple.

Singapore is hot and humid, so there was no point carrying heavy clothing.

The essentials mattered more:

Passport and documents.

Phone.

MacBook and chargers.

Power adapter.

Niyo card.

SGD cash.

Clothes.

Basic toiletries.

Power bank.

Travel essentials.

And enough empty space that I wouldn't regret buying something in Singapore.

The most important things stayed with me rather than disappearing somewhere deep inside the luggage.

Especially:

Passport.

Because there are mistakes you can laugh about later.

And then there is arriving at the airport without your passport.

I wasn't interested in discovering what that experience felt like.

The Night Before Leaving

This was probably when the feeling changed completely.

For months I had been saying:

“I'm planning a Singapore trip.”

Then:

“I'm going to Singapore next month.”

Then:

“I'm going next week.”

And suddenly there wasn't another week.

The suitcase was there.

Documents were ready.

Singapore dollars were ready.

The bookings were done.

The visa was approved.

The adapter had arrived.

Everything that had existed as screenshots, PDFs, browser tabs and conversations was now packed into luggage.

The planning phase was over.

September 8, 2026

My flight wasn't until September 10.

But my Singapore journey started two days earlier.

Because first, I had to get to Chennai.

At 11:45 PM, I would board my train from Mangalore.

Sleeper class.

₹510.

One suitcase.

One document file.

A passport.

And months of planning packed along with me.

The ₹60,000 Singapore experiment was no longer a spreadsheet.

It was starting.

Next stop:

Chennai.

And after that...

🇸🇬 Singapore.

← Previous: Singapore Part 1 — How I Planned a Solo Singapore Trip Under ₹60,000

Next → Singapore Part 3: Mangalore to Singapore — The Journey Finally Begins ✈️