20/11/08 We had quite a scary moment after passing through passport control and having our bags x-rayed at the Singapore border; there was a 'no photography allowed' sign inside the building, so I was careful not to take any photos, but once we were outside the building I thought it would be safe to do so, so Dave took a couple. Straight afterwards, we got back on our coach; literally 20 seconds later, a uniformed female guard appeared inside the coach and asked ...

18/11/08 Our journey down went okay. On arrival at lunchtime, we got a bus into the city centre, found an internet cafe and looked up places to stay. Eventually we found one and checked in; it was very nice actually for the price we were paying. After a bit of a rest, it was the evening, so we decided to walk to the Portuguese Settlement and have some food there after looking around. Melaka is unique in Malaysian terms, because is was ruled by the Portuquese, the...

16/11/08 Travelling from Penang to Kuala Lumpur today. On the journey down here we passed a field with a cricket match being played on it, and another field next to it with rugby posts in. I was quite surprised to see it, but I suppose it could have been an International School, and Malaysia is part of the Commonwealth after all so the British influence would come into play. The landscape was a lot more mountainous and forested than Thailand and Cambodia. We arr...

13/11/08 Our first full day in Georgetown. It's a UNESCO World Heritage City because of the amount of historical buildings which remain, and the inhabitants' unique culture has been more preserved here than in the other two Straits Settlements of Malacca and Singapore. The Straits Settlements was a British colony which existed from 1826 to 1946 - until 1867, when it became a Crown Colony, a Governor of the Straits Settlements was appointed by the British East Ind...

29-30/10/08 Most of the 29th was spent in an internet cafe (offering free internet) above the place from which we bought our tickets to Koh Tao, waiting with all our bags for the coach which was due to leave at 6 pm. We had lunch at a nearby Middle Eastern cafe, and some early dinner at the travel agent cafe downstairs from the internet room. The journey down went alright, though I didn't manage to get any sleep. We arrived at Chumporn at 2.30 am, and had to wait...