We had no problems this morning getting to Singapore, airport was smooth, and I wasn’t complaining that the only coffee we could find was a Starbucks, what a treat! It was a bit strange having a vegetable curry on the plane at 930am but it was a meal all the same.
Singapore Airport is just something else, it felt like arriving at a 5 star hotel, carpeted, pristine, impressive chandeliers. There was an announcement on the plane to declare and weapons or drugs, even toy guns as it was a mandatory death sentence if these are brought in. On the plane the steward had handed out arrival cards but hadn’t handed us one, with us being the only westerners on the plane we thought maybe it’s only borneons that needed them… After queuing for customs for almost half an hour we actually did need one and had to go to the back of the queue, frustrating! Once we got our bags we were asked to scan our backpacks…we must have looked dodgy!
Next we were to get from the airport to the harbour front, again straight forward and stress free, except the ticket buying situation but once we had the right change we got there.
Public transport is really clean, there were lots of rules and regulations for on the MRT… I liked it!! The only strange thing we saw was a man with his friend videoing a random man with his 2 young children…. Quite odd. We followed the instructions Paul sent to David very closely, and soon arrived in the basement of their condo. We actually bumped into Paul coming out to work.
That afternoon Sally and Joe took us to see the sights of the city, and what a tour guide Sally was, especially at the garden by the bay with all the plants. Perfect! The cloud dome was beautiful, all different species of plants from different altitudes. I particularly liked all the wood sculptures;the animals in the branches and the totem poles. As we had a ticket for both domes we took a quick look into the flower dome and time for a photo but it wasnt as impressive as the cloud.
Once we had found Joe, who had gone for a macdonalds we walked over the helix bridge towards a hawker centre for a recharge with a lime juice and saw a family of otters from the river, they were absolutely massive, must have been the size of Baxter easily.
The lime juice was really refreshing and it was also really refreshing to see such clean food stands, I think we’re going to like this city.
Everywhere we walked there seemed to be something happening, from street shows, lion dancing rehearsals, water shows, fireworks.
We walked through the lobby of the Fullerton Hotel… Wow, it was stunning, but even more impressive was the view once we left through the back, along the river was the old singapore shop houses, with the sheltered pavements out to the front, the view was so Impressive with the big skyscrapers overlooking the more quaint restaurants by the river.
We met Paul after work in a rooftop bar overlooking the River, it was a great place to sit as the sun went down with a few beers and a catch up.
For tea Paul and Sally suggested a Spanish tapas by the river. We were all over this as it was a world away from rice or noodles. What a feast we had, made even easier as none of us were eating meat, except of course David who could not resist the chorizo on the menu!
After dinner we walked slowly back to the MRT station which also had underground shopping centres too! Paul mastered his selfie taking and was impressed that he managed to get everyone in first attempt.
We passed under a bridge that was projecting all different stats from around the world, amounts of straws, and plastic bags being used, births, deaths and populations, and it was real time and changing as we watched. A very good way of getting a point across.
We were all absolutely shattered after a few drinks and a good meal, back we went on the MRT to see Jessie, I was super excited to be able to fuss. David was really quiet initially when he saw her and I could tell he was missing baxter but it didn’t take him long to start fussing her.
South East Asia 2019 