Jewel Changi Airport was officially opened on 17 April after a week of controlled public access. Taking the opportunity of the Good Friday weekend, I decided to visit the new shopping mall in the east. I am fully aware that the hype is still at its peak.

The plan was to be there as soon as I wake up, take some photos, settle down somewhere to catch up on some work. After a meal, I continue taking photos at night.

However, I ended up going at 12. Due the crowd, I could only take a few photos of the rain vortex in the afternoon. I also didn’t anticipate that the place would turn out to be one giant greenhouse. I was sweating through my t-shirt within moments of entering the forest valley.

The mall is made up of shops which are mostly already available in the malls here. Again, due to the crowd, I didn’t visit the crowd favourites like A&W, Shake Shack and Pokemon Center. The queue for Pokemon Center snaked through its level!

There was nowhere to do work as it was packed everywhere. I only managed to upload my photos during lunch at Xin Wang Cafe in T3, taking advantage of the wait for my food. The kitchen was struggling with fulfilling the orders made by the diners.

I skipped taking night shots as I felt uncomfortable at the crowd levels. The staff at Jewel began to deploy crowd control measures to direct the increasing human traffic at about 5pm. Visitors stopped from going up to level 5 at the escalators. Entries to the forest valley at level 3 was limited as there were too many people at that level.

Unless there is a need to go all the way to the airport earlier, it will be in June when I visit Jewel next, when I fly with SMU Chamber Choir to Austria. Hopefully, the hype around the new attraction has down die by then.

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