Author: sigormley

Today we left Singapore again, this time by train and in the direction of Kuala Lumpur. Just before we crossed the causeway to Malaysia, and only minutes after leaving, everyone had to get off the train, go through Singaporian Immigration then get back on, I’m sure there’s an easier way. We didn’t get a stamp in our passports for Malaysia, the train just carried on, hopefully we don’t need one…
The train had left half an hour late, and the driver seemed intent on making up the time, but the train did not agree. Rocking furiously from side to side, it made me wonder what it would take for a carriage to come off the rails. To get between carriages required a leap across a wobbly bit of metal, with the tracks whizzing past underneath. Even after safely navigating that, there was the small matter of open carriage doors. Not so bad until you add the movement of the carriages. After several attempts I concluded that it was safest to just stay in our seats!
All fun and games though, seeing as we made it to KL in one piece. The taxi system here is the best, you pay at a counter in advance before even finding the taxi – no bartering, unexpected charges etc, just pay and go. Our British pounds stretch a bit further here (the taxi ride cost £2:10, how far could you go for that in the UK?) and so we have splashed out on a rather plush hotel, our room is great, and so long as you push your nose up to the glass of the window and squint a little, it boasts views of the top of the Petronas Towers, sweet!

Having been lured into buying cheap tickets for the bird park, it seemed rude not to go. The talking birds were suspiciously quiet, giving you odd looks when you talked to them (maybe I need more of a chinese-english accent), but at least we weren’t as bad as another western tourist who tried speaking to every single bird in the park in the hope they would talk back (which they didn’t!). It was also weird seeing the Australian birds captive in a zoo, like the Australian Pelican that had a fish wriggling in it’s mouth, and was then chased around by another, much larger pelican in hope of a feed. As soon as we walked into the Lorikeet enclosure (another Aussie bird, a small red parrot), one landed on Caroline who screamed, so it landed on me instead, pirate style. At $2 to feed them, who could resist, within seconds a flock of them had landed on me, all jostling for a slurp of the murky brown liquid, and only outnumbered by the gathering Japanese tourists. Occasionally, one would take a nibble of a t-shirt or finger, I wonder if they get bored of the same old slop (the birds that is, not the tourists…).

With 2 pairs of shoes to choose from and only one night to drink in Raffles, Caroline had to pick her favourite. Saying that, we needn’t have got dressed up so much, the place was full of tourists (who’d have guessed!), and the floor littered with peanut shells that crunch unpleasantly underfoot, as the thing to do is eat peanuts and chuck the rest on the floor (if anyone knows why please let us know). But we had our one or two Singapore Slings, revelled in the colonial surroundings and left, another landmark done.

We’ve been in Singapore for a couple of nights, we haven’t done much sightseeing, although shopping and eating do seem to be a big proportion of the tourist to-do lists.
Around the corner from the hotel is the Buddhist Tooth Relic Temple, a modern (there’s a car park in the basement!) temple, full of buddha statues and gold. The sceptic in me wondered why they emphasised inner peace resulting from giving money to the temple, and every brick and tile could be sponsored. I suppose they are at least being open about it, and there was a whole lot of gold to pay for.
That evening we went to the zoo, or more accurately the one and only Singapore Night Safari. Suitably laden with mozzie repellent we caught a tram around the park, making out the dusky shadows of animals as we drove past – the photo is of a rhino, and about as good as they got, so unusually for me, I just watched the animals. Finally we wandered around the walkways, constantly imagining mozzie bites, but seeing the animals when they are naturally active puts a new slant on a visit to the zoo. It would’ve been good if the bats in the walk-through enclosure weren’t so active!

All good things come to an end, but at least we had until the afternoon on Bintan before being dragged kicking and screaming to the Singapore Ferry. No longer will we have waiters who keep coming around to pour your drink for you, place your napkin on your lap, or fold your towels if you go for a swim. There’s even a mini culture shock back in Singapore when nobody smiles sweetly and says hello when you pass. In short, we liked Bintan, if you’re passing through Singapore at any point, make sure you visit!
Our next hotel, whilst not a touch on the Angsana in Bintan, is in the middle of Chinatown. We also arrived at the best time to experience Chinatown – dinner time! Our first call was to the food street, deftly avoiding the “pig liver” stall we made for the Thai stall and had spicy chilli chicken, the even hotter Mee Goreng noodles and pineapple rice – served in a pineapple! So simple and so nice.
Next was of course the markets, so cheap yet so full of useless tat, like silk tissue box covers, I mean who has a need for that? So we only bought three.

The weather gods were smiling on us today, during breakfast the sky turned black and there was a heavy tropical downpour, just enough to entertain us whilst we ate, cool down the air, and clear out the pool. By the time we got to the pool, the sun was out in full strength and we got down to some serious sun, swim, sun, snorkel, sun routine. Not that we don’t appreciate all this easy living, our holiday thus far has been as amazing as it has been long, and it still doesn’t feel right that we get to do all this stuff!
Caroline’s parents left today too, the original plan was to spend a couple of nights, but then I’m not too good at reading itineraries! We had dinner down at the beach again, but this time with musicians and countless different types of Indonesian/Malaysian Satay skewers (including little squids!) – the prospect of Malaysia is looking better by the day!

The pressure was on for me to do something crazy, leap off something or generally scare myself somehow for my 30th birthday, but I’m getting old and need to slow it down. So we went to Perth Mint, watched them pour gold bullion and had the official commemorative coin made for our World Tour. That’s more like it, much more mature. (ok, we couldn’t actually find anything to jump off, we’ll keep looking!)
I’d also like to say a big thanks to Mel, my little big sister who compiled an album of photos of my life and stories from friends and family, along with getting it hand delivered to me here in Australia – it really made my birthday special. Thanks as well to everyone who wrote something, and I hope Mel gets reinstated on Facebook after being flagged as a spammer for sending too many anonymous messages!

Well we’ve gone north, so it’d be rude not to go south. A combination of the weather turning wet, and the fact there’s not too much to do in the area when it’s off season, wet and cold (even the tourist information manager was stumped…) meant that the highlight of our day was spotting some rain drenched kangaroos. Better still, one had a joey squirming around in her pouch, but it was still a slow day.