Tampines Changkat Butterfly Garden

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I had heard of Tampines Changkat Butterfly Garden before and often visited the surrounding areas, but I hadn’t really been there until this trip. The name brings up lovely images of butterflies fluttering everywhere in the garden, doesn’t it?

So, Alex and I went there on a weekend. We took a bus to the nearest bus stop and walked from there. Perhaps because I wasn’t very familiar with the area, it took us a while to reach the garden.

On the way, we passed through Tampines Round Market & Food Centre, and I made a mental note to go back there again as a separate trip for my channel. For now, we must not get sidetracked, so we pressed on to the garden.

We arrived at the garden soon after, as it was quite close to Tampines Round Market. It was a lovely small garden nestled between HDB blocks and condos. The residents in that area have many nice amenities nearby—the market and the garden!

There were many small flowers blooming in the garden. You won’t see them right from the get-go, though. When you enter the garden, you would just see a lot of greenery and vaguely notice some colors mixed in from the blooming plants. But if you slow down and look, you’ll see the blooms. They always cheer me up.

If you are like me and love looking at flowers and trees, you’ll notice Singapore now has many more blooms than ten years ago. I feel the city has become more mindful about creating aesthetically pleasing trees and bushes—especially around new BTOs. In the past, Singapore was just green—green bushes and trees everywhere. But now I see foliage of slightly different colors mixed with some blooming plants—at least around the district where I live. I always appreciate such sights. So whoever is working hard to beautify Singapore with plants, thank you.

I got sidetracked again. Back to the garden! I didn’t see any butterflies there. All the same, I enjoyed strolling in the garden. As we were walking around, we saw a lookout and decided to walk up there. On the way, I saw this massive tree growing near the lookout and was quite fascinated by it.

After admiring it for a bit, we continued but got sidetracked again when Alex found a fitness corner and spent some time using the equipment. He loves these places. They are like another type of playground for him. After he had played enough, we continued to the lookout.

In front of us, a group of children were playing on a trampoline.

I asked, “Alex, do you want to join them?”

He walked on. Okay, he didn’t want to join them.

But soon, we came across another trampoline. He immediately went up there and jumped. You might think his autism made him socially distant, but that’s a misconception. Autistic individuals vary among themselves when it comes to their level of extroversion and introversion—just like neurotypicals do. Alex is an individual who craves social interaction with a small group of people he trusts, but he’s not always keen to do it with strangers.

After this final sidetrack, we reached the lookout—which was built around a large tree and designed in such a way that you could see the garden from the lookout. The place was cool under the shade of the large tree. I would love to read and relax there.

We actually continued our journey from there to Tampines Mall to have lunch and then took the IKEA shuttle—the main highlight of the trip for Alex. I’ll post about it next week.

This little trip to Tampines Changkat Butterfly Garden reminded me to be flexible about making a few stops here and there, instead of being too focused on the goal of reaching some place. It makes the trip a lot more pleasant for everyone.

If you love to know more about our Singapore explorations, do please check out Humble Journeys Index where you can search the adventures by districts.