World's Floating Bookshop

Yesterday marks the first day of December school holiday for school going children after the stressful final exams. The results were out and our son did a pretty good job in his studies.

So, as a reward for his effort and achievements, the least I could do was to take him for a well deserved outing. I guess I am more excited with this school holiday than he is.

The peak of the outing was being on-board a ship named MV Doulos, that has come to Singapore. Docked just behind VivoCity, this ship is a floating bookshop that tours the world "Bringing Knowledge, Help & Hope."

Build in 1914, it was listed in the Guinness World Records as the oldest active ocean-going passenger vessel. Initially called Medina, it was a cargo ship that routed between New York and Calveston, Texas.

Then as Roma, carrying pilgrims and immigrants for a few years until it was remodelled to become a cruise liner in the Mediterranean called Franca C.

In 1977, it was named as Doulos and has become a floating bookshop till today.

Throngs of children accompanied by their parents, like ourselves came to cease the opportunity to be on-board a floating bookshop.

It was quite educational for the children and adults as well as the crew members were of different nationalities were at hand to explain the various cultures and life on-board the ship of knowledge and hope.

An exciting experience just to be on-board, and get to tour around the vessel that has been around for 92 years. Never mind that it was stationary, berthed at HarbourFront.

My son enjoyed thoroughly especially when we reached the bookshop deck. It was hot and humid inside packed with as many people as there were books.

My son picked 4 books - 2 books on Sketching Guides of Wild and Farm Animals, a book on Famous Quotes and a book on Care For Tropical Aquarium Fish. Using a point conversion system of 100 units that was equivalent to S$4.00.

I bought myself a Doulos Mug as a souvenir from this amazing Guinness world-record vessel.


Since the day was still young, and we had plenty of energy left. We escaped to the cooler enclave of VivoCity where we watched an animated movie - Flushed Away, each armed with a large pop-corn and a large Ice Lemon Tea.

Good movie. The scenes of London at the beginning of the movie were amazingly true-to-life that I could not tell whether they used real scenery or were recreated with CGI. Truly realistic!

A good day spent together, minus Wifey who... yes, tending to the shop. We will tell her all about our good day today. Hope she had a good day at the shop too.