It started out as an innocuous conversation between father and son on the many stand-up cow posters at around Toa Payoh Town Garden as we drove past during one of our many Chinese New Year house visits. P commented on the resurgence of these "moo-moos", previously also found at many of Singapore grass patches and our two boys were thrilled that they would exclaim whenever they saw one. This time round, the cows donned on big chinese characters which meant "spring" and "fortune", in bright and cheerful primary colours - yellow, red and blue, plus their close secondary friend - green. Some which were raised up higher with higher transparent plastic stilts, even carried a bag of gold - somewhat akin to Santa Claus.
It was P's daddy who suggested to drive around Singapore and take photographs with these adorable posters. My two boys were all too eager to go for it.
Today was a balmy day. The sun was gentle on the skin, the glare was not too overwhelming with occassional passing giant clouds providing the much needed shade. We planned our trip - start from the city drove up to the west up to hit Tuas, before heading northwards where we had earlier spotted the cows.
It was after a 15 minutes drive that we net our first catch - at West Coast Park. About 5 to 8 cow posters were stuck on a flat grass patch. We happily parked our car before grabbing our camera and started snapping.
Next we proceeded back to our car. But there was a moo-moo drought from West Coast Park all the way up to Tuas. But we did a little stop-over at a seemingly out-of-Singapore place - the Rail Mall. There we were greeted by surface carparks which led us to a stretch of shophouses with some upmarket eateries. We went into Coffee Bean to quench our thirst. It remained me of the many road trips that we had when we were in the States where we would stop to satisfy our hunger pangs.
After the much needed sustenance, we continued our journey in search of more moo-moos. Good old memories of our much cherished roadtrips together in the States continued to flow back. I remembered that I was awe-struck by the tapestry of yellow, red, rust and green during fall along the US road as we drove. This time round, I realised that Singapore too has much to offer not just sweltering summer. Along the expressway, I saw the splendour of summer with the magnificent raintrees and the many different tropical plants, beaming hues of green.
So did we find any more moo-moos? Yes, just as intrepid as the ox, we continued our journey and found them at Bishan Park. More of these adorable cow posters greeted us at Braddell Road and of course, at Toa Payoh Town Garden.
So the lesson learnt here is: Many a time, we already have the best things in life. Just like when we first saw the moo-moos in Toa Payoh and have never paid heed to the beautiful greeneries in Singapore. But a detour is good as it makes us realise that gold is actually at our own backyard.
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