Peranakan Katong and Joo Chiat

The Peranakans, or Straits Chinese, are the descendants of Chinese traders who settled in the Malay world generations ago and built a culture out of the mixture: Malay-influenced cooking, an ornate decorative style, their own creole language, and a formidable domestic aesthetic of beaded slippers, embroidered kebaya and porcelain in improbable pinks and greens. Katong and Joo Chiat in the east is where that world is most visible, above all on Koon Seng Road, a terrace of shophouses with pastel facades, ceramic tiles, carved timber and pintu pagar swing doors that is the most photographed street in the neighbourhood. The other reason to come is katong laksa, a thick coconut-and-prawn noodle soup served with the noodles cut short so it can be eaten with a spoon alone, and there are long-standing rival stalls all claiming to be the original.

What you actually see

• Koon Seng Road - the terrace of pastel shophouses with tiles and swing doors.
• Katong laksa - the local coconut noodle soup, eaten with a spoon.
• Peranakan crafts - beadwork, kebaya and porcelain in the shops and museum.
• Joo Chiat's food street - kueh, popiah and old-style coffee shops.

When to go

Year-round; mornings are best for the shophouse light and for eating kueh at breakfast, and the heat makes midday walking hard. Weekends are livelier in the cafés and busier on Koon Seng Road, where people queue to photograph the same terrace.

Honest expectations

Koon Seng Road is a residential street and people live behind those facades, so photographing through windows and blocking the pavement in groups is intrusive. The neighbourhood has gentrified considerably, and some of the Peranakan shops are recent boutiques rather than old family businesses. The laksa rivalry means several shops claim to be the original, which is unresolvable and part of the fun.

Nearby

East Coast Park and its beach are a short walk; the city centre is fifteen minutes by MRT.