Singapore Slinging

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Wednesday July 23, 2008 - After saying good bye to Indonesia, I boarded my afternoon flight for Singapore. The flight was fine and once I landed in Singapore I picked up my luggage and found the train into the city. I had already pre-booked my hostel here, which is unusual for me, but I had been told that the cheaper places filled up in advance, and I am nothing if not a cheaper place kind of girl. On the train I saw a couple who had just gotten on at the airport as well, and who were clearly foreigners as well. Being tired and sad from leaving Bali, I didn't much care at the time. Plus I figured now was not the time for friends - I hadn't been alone in weeks, and I had only three days in Singapore, so I figured I would take it all in on my own. Little did I know I would spend the next several days with this couple I was ignoring just now. For the time being, I just snuck little glances at them from time to time. I also listened to the talk of the teenage boys all around me. I was sure they were speaking Chinese one moment, and then the next I wa ssure I had heard English. I wondered if perhaps this was my mind's way of believing I could speak another language, like when I start to fall asleep on buses with Asian kareoke and I'm SURE I can understand the lyrics - that if you just listen harder it becomes English. In this case, it was much simpler. They were speaking "Singlish", a Singapore-ized version of the language with accents that make it sound more Asian.

Once we alighted at the train station (hahaha - sorry. Had to throw that in there as that is the common word used in Singapore for departing the train) I made my way outside and opened up my map as only an outsider would do. I quickly found my way and started walking at breakneck speed to get to the hostel. In the mean time I saw the couple doing the same but I got in front of them at some point. There were two of them - they would be fine. Once I got to the hostel a few minutes later, I began the checking-in process. This was such a formal place, with so many rules. Like Singapore itself. As I was reading over the list of rule, who should enter but my new friends. Turns out their names were Ed and Ali. They're British and will be traveling for about two years. Somehow these two are living the life I wanted. Nice. We all got our rom assignments in our dorms and agreed to meet back for dinner. We had to leave our shoes downstairs - no shoes upstairs at all! Even in the bathrooms. This place better be clean. I got to my room and found my assigned bed. It was a loft - no one below me, but really high and wobbly. After some consideration and pleading, I was able to get my room changed - to Ed and Ali's room, no less. Ed even helped me move the sheets I had so frighteningly put on my oh-so-high bunk. I still had a top bunk, but this one was a normal height and much less scary. We went out for dinner to a nearby crazily air-con food court and ate up. Singapore is not cheap, but the food certainly can be. And remember, it was a billion degrees outside, just like the rest of Asia, so the air-con was a bit of a treat. Almost slept there. After dinner I used the free 30 min of internet in the hostel, but it was so slow that I could do nothing. Amazingly, Ed and Ali are traveling with a wee tiny laptop, and they let me use that to check my emails. Then sleep.

Thursday I did have a lot of time on my own. I woke up late - 8am - and then had a much needed shower. After that, some internet checking on a better computer, followed by a breakfast made by my new friends. So nice! The hostel provides a stove and hot water along with tea and coffee, eggs, and bread. So Ed made us all some eggs on toast and Ali made the tea. It was a lovely breakfast. I cleaned up after, my speacialty. Cooking, no. Cleaning, yes. After breakfast we parted ways for the day. Ed and Ali had to start searching into visas for Russia and China (which they were concerned about due to the Olympics), and I wanted to roam around town and see if I could sweat even more. I started out buying a bottle of water to prevent dehydration, and took off with my map. Such a tourist. I hit Arab St, Chinatown and Indiatown, as well as most of the downtown as I walked everywhere. I went to the Raffles hotel, which is a famous and quite beautiful historic hotel. Wasn't sure they would let me in, but it was nothing after Sebastien's coup of the Four Seasons. I bought a bubble tea and some lunch and had a generally good and tiring day. I stopped at a relatively cheap internet place that was super-fast, and then went back to the hotel to meet my friends for dinner. When I got there Ali wasn't feeling well, and she was laying down. She decided not to come to dinner, so Ed and I went to the same nearby food court. We had way too much food and then fun deciding what to bring back for Ali that she might like or feel like eating. She is a vegetarian and everything was in picture form, but we still weren't sure what most of it was. It rained on us on the way back, but it felt nice. We brought Ali her food and then I showered. Somewhere in there I also move my bed down to the lower level, which made me quite happy. Stayed up a bit late and then called it a night.

Friday was the day for the Zoo and Night Safari. This is basically why I came to Singapore. It's a wolrd class zoo, and then a separate night zoo, so you can actually see the nocturnal animals awake. Clever! One of the jaguars I worked with in Boston transfered to this zoo while I was there, and it was cool to see where they brought him. I woke up around 8:30 and made some breakfast and we kind of lazed around for a while. We didn't really get a move on until noon, which was far too late for all we had planned. But what can you do? The more people, the more lazy. But fun too. So we took the public tranport - a train and a bus - to the zoo. It took about an hour and was easy. The zoo itself it so cool. It has an amazing layout, and many open designs. The first exhibit you see if for the Golden-lion tamarins - a little monkey from South America. It had no enclosure that I could see at all - they just roamed over several adjoining trees. It was very nice. They even have two times in the day where the orangutans are "free" and walking through the park holding hands with each other and with the zookeepers. Crazy! So not going to happen here, and with good reason. But the exhibits were really spacious and well planned. They had feedings of different animals, and we were able to catch the tiger and polar bear feedings. It was very hot but luckily cloudy, so it was a bit cooler. We were all tired and by the end of the day, we had seen most of the zoo. Then we had an hour for dinner before the Night Safari opened. I resented paying $15 for a bad burger meal, just as I would in a theme park in the states. But since I was off to Hawaii in a few days time (and starving), I decided to suck it up. From our seats, we were able to watch a show that was performed and then enter the Night Safari. There were different trails to walk down, as well as a train that takes you around the zoo to other parks than the trails can access. I think we saw everything, though it started out frustrating, surrounded by a loud French tour group at every turn. Along the way we also saw some animals show and of course, bats. It was a really good night. We had to leave around 11pm in order to get the bus back to town. It was a special bus that would take us close to the hostel, no train involved. We got back around midnight and it didn't take long before I was asleep. A good ending to a good time in Singapore.

Saturday was a bit of a long day from hell. But in a nice way. I had to leave Singapore for my flight in Malaysia that night, and Ed and Ali decide to come with me to see some of Malaysia before heading north. They were planning to stay in Singapore a few more days, and then realized they were essentially done. So we got up at 7:30, got ready, packed up, had breakfast, changed money and then went to the bus station to buy a ticket to JB, just over the border into Malaysia. There were two lines and we weren't sure which was the line we should be in. I forget why, but we chose the wrong one. Even though we had waited in the entire line side by side the correct line, they made us wait again in the new line because that's the way it is. It pissed us all off, but what can you do? Finally we got on the bus and got going. It wasn't too bad, but once we got to JB, we were all hungry but had to board another bus immediately as it was leaving for Kuala Lumpur. This bus was hot and about a five hour bus ride to KL. I slept, I chatted, I read. Once we arrived, it was still plenty early for me to have dinner and then go to the airport for my 1am flight. It took us ages to find a hostel for Ed and Ali, forever walking and sweating, but we finally found one. Once they had settled in we went for some classic Malaysian food, and all was well with the world. I ate mei goreng - fried noodles like they can't do it in Indonesia - ansd roti - a magical flat bread type thing. Yum and yum. Finally it was time me for to say good bye. We walked back to the hostel where I picked up my bag, then I said good bye to Ed and Ali and got on the monorail that would take me to the train to the airport. Phew! Can you imagine how much faster these could happen if I was willing to take a taxi? Just doing my part to be as green as possible. Fortunately it coincides with my being poor and cheap. At the airport I found some free internet, waited my turn, and spent five minutes entertaining myself before the flight. Next stop(over) - Korea!

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