Drink a Singapore Sling where it was invented and drop the shells on the floor
1915, and littering is encouraged
The Long Bar sits on the second floor of Raffles Hotel, fitted out as a 1920s Malayan plantation bar with rattan punkah fans swinging overhead.
Why it's unique
Ngiam Tong Boon created the Singapore Sling here in 1915. The design brief was social rather than culinary: gin, Bénédictine, cherry liqueur and pineapple juice, coloured pink so that it passed for a fruit drink at a time when a woman drinking alcohol in public was not done. A globally known cocktail has one birthplace and this is it.
The second thing is the floor. Peanuts are free, there are no bowls, and you are expected to drop the shells at your feet — a habit of Ngiam's that became the house rule. Singapore fines people for chewing gum and failing to flush. This is the one room in the country where making a mess is the tradition.
Before you go
It is expensive and it is a tourist ritual, and knowing that in advance is most of enjoying it. The Sling now comes from an automated mixer rather than being built by hand, which purists mind and most people do not.
Go in the afternoon rather than the evening; the queue in the evening is long and the room is better half-empty. Smart casual is enforced.