Ni hao (Hello in chinese)


Did you know that Singapore is made up of 70% chinese people, after 9 days travelling we have finally learnt something interesting. Dont know about the rest though, probably all singaporeans. Anyway, we have arrived in possibly the cleaniest place on earth other than jackie reads new cream carpet. Its such a great place, the people are nice, the hostel is great, the air is clean and its so hot. Matt's peeling like a banana after Koh Samui and has been ill for the last two days, no thanks to rach which meant that the first day was spent floating around the singapore streets. We arrived at the hostel after a MRT ride (train system) at about half 5 in the afternoon so we had enough time to get settled into our dormitory room which is quite cool. One of the blokes in the room that we have been getting to know is a kiwi so hopefully we can meet up with him when we get to New Zealand. We went into clarke quay which was great although matt was in phase 1 of the cold so he wasnt to lively. Had a a meal by the river and found out how expensive singapore can be and went back to the hostel for a drink on the roof terrace.
The second day was spent dragging Matt around Singapore's sights, (who felt as though he was being ponded in the head by a shovel) we went to Orchard Road and in and out and in and out and in and out of the many shopping centres, only due to the arctic climate air conditioning they all have. We went to Clarke Quay again and then back home for a nap because we had booked a night safari in the evening. The night safari was great, we were dropped off and we went on the tram ride which was interesting. Rachael wondered why the animals were all in the locations that they had been shown on in the map, maybe it was because of the electric wires and the 15 foot moat around each animal enclosure, who knows, remains a mystery why the lion wouldnt attack the sleeping zebra next door. After a trip inside the bat enclosure, which was too good an opportunity for Matt to resist a few pokes and taps to the later traumatised rachael (they were pretty big bats though) we went for a chicken tikka masala meal and a haagen dazs single scoop ice cream, guess which cost more, another letter in the post. We watched a traditional culture show and then got back on the coach home for another session on the roof terrace.
The whole of the third day was spent at sentosa island (a resort island south of singapore)-fact 2! plenty more coming. We left at about 11am after leaving the mashed potato and rice pudding breakfast (one of these hostels where last nights dinner is put to good use) and arrived at the island on the monorail at about 12.30. We booked a package ticket which included a luge ride, a sky lift, the tiger viewing tower, a pirates 4d show, a sights of singapore museum and a tour around the merlion (mermaid slash lion is singapore's symbol- ATTENTION: do not mistake this blog for wikipidea, these facts are gonna keep on coming). So come 2 o'clock we had finished all of them and now had to wait 7 hours until the sights of the sea show which we booked late because we had SO much to get done up until then! After a 2 hour nap, another trip to 7/11, a bus to the other side of the island? and a sit on the beach to have a partial view of the earlier performance we finally made it into the auditorium to which matt considered to be the cheasiest thing since cliff richards last christmas music video. We took the MRT into Chinatown where matt felt it was neccessary to try the local cuisine and after digesting what can only be described as a health inspectors worst nightmare (was bloody good though) we went back to the hotel.
Our fourth day was spent travelling around the last few sights of singapore such as Raffles hotel, boat quay, Burger King, singapores many toilets (no thanks to matts prawn noodles) and singapores largest street market, Bugis Street. We then hopped onto the MRT back to the airport to begin our next trip, AUSTRALIA!
We will be blogging again when we get to Cairns.

Pictures are now up and ready to look at.

Love

Rach and Matt xxx