Singapore, the hedonistic capital of SE Asia. Famous for its extravagent hotels and multiple shopping malls, the more 5* visitors will probably be familiar with Orchard Street where most of this is, however we as the poor back packers were staying in one of Singapores many ethnic districts called Little India. Arriving at night to what looked like a dirty back street in Sri Lanka came as quite a culture shock as you can imagine knuckles were growing white as we held our hands tightly together walking down the street! However our hostel was lovely - basic but very clean and thats all we need!

On our 1st day we finally dragged ourselves out of bed at mid-day after catching up on 2 days sleep. We caught the MRT (tube) to Clarkes Quay which is the main waterfront on the Singapore River. This area is full of the funkiest bars you will ever come across! One bar in particular stood out - named as "The Clinic" which was exactly like stepping into an operating theatre; wheelchairs for seating and cocktails delivered through blood transfusion kits, IV drips and syringes (none of which were second hand!) Unfortuately we could only watch as we weren't willing to pay 25 pounds for a cocktail! Singapore is notorious for its massively inflated alcohol price. A cheap pint of beer being considered as being between 5 and 10 pounds! We then wandered over to Fort Canning Park Hill, here we visited the founder of modern Singapore, Sir Raffles' House, we then wandered through the Spice Gardens swatting off mossies to see Fort Canning which was the British army barracks in the 1800s. Then we visited the "Battle Box' which was a secret bunker housing the British army generals during WWII and was the sight for the decision to surrender Singapore to the japanese in 1942. It was really interesting learning about the history behind Singapore. Our final tourist stop was to find Singapores oldest and most famous hotel - the Raffles Hotel. The next day we caught a sightseeing bus around the city, firstly we stopped at the beautiful Botanical Gardens, which was once the jungle in the middle of the city ( one of 2 only botanical gardens to be in the middle of a city). Apparently as well as being a place of beauty full of orchids and tropical trees its functionally used to reduce heat and pollution and increase oxygenation of the city. We then stopped off in Orchard St for some lunch locating our first Hawker Centre for some asian lunch! Next we got off at the Asian Civilisation Museum and learnt all about how Singapore has developed and changed over the last 2000 yrs and why there is such a rich ethnic culture here. We then went for an ice-cream and were disappointed with ourselves for not trying the sweetcorn, yam, red bean or the local delicacy durian (a very stinky, acquired tasty fruit thats banned from shopping malls and the MRT!). Finally we did a night cruise down the Singapore River, Singapore really comes to life at night as the whole place illuminates like a Christmas tree! The thing with Singapore is they're always trying to be the biggest and best; they have the worlds biggest wheel (london eye) being 5m taller, the worlds biggest water fountain and are attempting to build the worlds biggest airport. For our final day we took another sightseeing bus around Singapores cultural heritage centres, stopping off in Chinatown, for some local pastries and some lunch. We finally returned back to Little India for their local delicacy - the 6" Subway! All in all we really enjoyed our stay in Singapore and feel we got a broad experience. Looking forward to return for the day after Borneo..............