Sultry Singapore

When I looked up sultry in the dictionary it was the perfect description of Singapore. There is something sexy about the architecture and the beautiful young people, the sleek quality of newness on every corner. And the heat. That's the best part of this definition. characterized by oppressive heat and humidity; "the summer was sultry and oppressive"; "the stifling atmosphere"; "the sulfurous atmosphere preceding a thunderstorm". I can't imagine living in a stifling heat like that all year round. That's all that I could think of in that heat: 'it's like this the whole year round'.

I enjoyed Singapore. It was clean and I felt like I was in a city that I could relate to again. It wasn't much outside of my comfort zone, an idea that was personified by all the of the western expats. We spent two nights in a classic hostel which was very central and pretty clean. On the 3-6th nights we stayed with a friend of Alex's, Lorrie. Lorrie worked with Alex in Ware at GSK. She was just transferred to Singapore for a year. Although Lorrie and I got along really well and I was very glad to have gotten to know her and spend time with her, it was also so nice to stay with her as we got to stay in a home. It's amazing how a home can feel after 6 weeks on the road. We got to do laundry and have music playing in the background, skype our families and generally feel safe and happy.

We ate some fantastic food, both at hawker centres and in restaurants. It is a very nice to place to visit, sorry Dad. Some of the sites we saw: Botanical Gardens (so georgeous, and free), National Singapore museum, Little India, Boat Quay, Clrke Quay, Colonial district and Central Business District, which really felt like Canary Wharf. Two things I want to see if we go back: the zoo, I was sorry we didn't get a chance to see that. and China town.

On our second to last day we went to Parasilk, an electronics store that my father found on through his online research to be the best store in Singapore for such things. And low and behold when I arrived, Lorrie confirmed this to be true. Well done, dad! We had a chat about cameras and we decided on the Panasonic LX3 Lumix. We took the camera out to play the first night and it takes some great photos. It is not as powerful as the proper SLR but because of the size I am so happy with it. We compared the processors with a couple of other small SLR-like cameras and this one had the best processor. It is not a large optical zoom, 3 I think, but the camera is 10 mega pixels, so we can always crop the picture after the fact. I feel like the size is the most important part of it, it is not only small, but it seemed to have better specs than some of its peers. The guy said it was good for night shots. And the brilliant thing is that it does do good photos in low light. If we want to open the shutter for longer, we can, but since it is not a real SLR you can't feel the shutter opening and closing. The result is that it doesn't quite do it as well, but I am so happy with this. The lens is also 24mm so we can take wide angle. The aspect can be changed from 4:3 to 3:2 (original 36mm film aspect) and 16:9. And of course, you can manually change all of the settings if you want. oh and you can set it to auto so it chooses the best setting, eg portrait or macro. Murphy was right about having a camera that takes good pix, it makes the world of difference.

On Tuesday morning we took a very early morning train out of Singapore and into Malaysia. it was a fine train ride other than the fact that we had said a proper goodbye to Lorrie with lots of drinks. It felt like an eternity on the train. We arrived in Jerantut around 1pm. We found a hotel and crashed. Jerantut is only a stopping point on your way to Taman Negara. We are currently in the little village that serves this national park. Taman Negara is apparently the oldest rainforest in the world, at 130 million years it survived the ice age. We hired a guide and went with a couple we met on our way up to the park. The couple, two Aussies, at the beginning of their year of travel, were the perfect hiking companions. The boys carried the heavy packs and the girls trudged along in our day packs. We trekked for 7 hours and made it to a hide, which is as it is described, a hut on concrete stilts to hide from animals. It was 12 wooden bunks and that's it. The toilet didn't flush. If no one is going to go out there every day (and they shouldn't) the park should put in squat toilets. It's much cleaner. Unfortunately we didn't see anything more than a Tapir, but it was worth the trek and the excitement of going out there. Today we hiked another hour to a jetty and got motorised canoe back to Kuala Tahan where our hostel is. Most of the last 36 hours can be better described with pictures. I haven't downloaded them yet, but I will, hopefully. I think one thing that can not be fully described is the amount of liquid our bodies expelled in this heat. It looked like each of us had gone swimming in our clothes. Alas it was only sweat. literally dripping. quite a picture. Canopy walkway tomorrow then off to KL.

If I have forgotten to tell everyone about anything in particular you were looking forward to hearing about, maybe I mentioned it to you or someone else? feel free to remind or ask me.

Off to bed to sleep in a mediocre mattress that will feel like the softest foam mattress after the wooden planks last night.

And then there were two...

After 2 days in Delhi, with a whirlwind tour of the sights we headed to Agra.  We saw the immense but incredibly beautiful Taj Mahal.  It was crowded, with mostly Indians, but the awesome presence was still there. The sheer amount of work that went into it is just amazing and totally pretty. That afternoon we were very skillfully tricked into going to look at a man's shop.  He was a very sweet man who showed us his entire collection of old coins and money from around the world.  We did end up buying a little necklace from him, well mom did.  but he was so sweet I just had to share him with you all.  The next day we went to Fatepur Sikhri.  This was one of the capitals of the Mughals.  If I remember correctly, Akbar was not producing heirs so he went to visit a holy man to bless his wife.  When she had three sons after that, he moved his capital there and built an immense fort (as all of them were immense).  The fort was only maintained for 13 years as there was not a great water supply.  Then back to Delhi.  NO MORE GUIDES!  we were totally guided out at this point. Our final day we went to see the red fort in Delhi.  And had the first rain in 6 weeks! Had a lovely final dinner at a revolving restaurant in Connaught Place.  It's a little hokey, but worth seeing Delhi from that viewpoint.

Today will be our first full day without any family.  We left Aleen yesterday, albeit at 5 in the morning, for the international airport in Delhi.  We had a painless flight to Singapore.  My first City-State.  Is that the right term for a city that is also the country?

The aiport is by far the nicest airport i've ever seen.  Now, it's possible that since I came straight from India the cleanliness surprised me more than I thought it would.  So if that was the case, it is in my top five nicest airports.  The design, cleanliness, layout, cleanliness, amenities, and oh yeah, cleanliness were all so beautiful.  I know the clean impact wasa reaction from India.  Alex has a friend who is on a graduate trainee program here with Glaxo Smith Kline so we first made our way to the McDonald's after Customs and Immigration to check our email, for free.  We couldn't stay with her immediately, so we headed to the Backpackers Cozy Corner on the edge of the colonial district.  The MRT was easy to navigate, and cheap at S$1.48 to go for a half hour to our stop from the airport.  Upon arrival, they had my reservation (Sorry dad, I had to book somewhere the first time, to ease leaving you guys, but you should know I don't have any others booked).  We freshened up and headed out.  We ate in one of the food courts.  Delicous food! I could be happy eating in Singapore for a long time.  The culture here is from many Asian countries so the food here is usually pretty good.  We had Bibimbab and a duck noodle dish for S$11 total.  We then walked around for about an hour.  Alex said a few times how he really felt like he was in the USA.  The feel of the streets has a strange western feel. But when that humidity wave comes over you, you remember you must be in SE Asia.  We are meeting up with Lorrie, Alex's friend this afternoon after work.  And hopefully we'll stay with her for a few more nights so we can afford to stay in Singapore. 

That's all for now.

love,
K

Correction

I would like to make it absolutely clear that the fantastic term "Globalia", used in my last entry was not created by me, but my witty brother Murphy.  On our second night in Kolkata, five of us went to dinner in a nice restaurant in a mall.  Yes, it is fairly normal to have nice restaurants in malls as it is where the upper crust go shopping. Opon arrival in the mall, we were all quite surprised that the stark difference between outside and inside.  The mall and its contents could have been anywhere in the globe.  When we entered the restaurant (Oh, Calcutta, it was named), Murphy declared: "oh, it's Indian Night at Globalia".  By far one of the best quotes from the trip.  I have now appropriated the term for the homogenising places around the world in my vocabulary.  Thanks Murphy.  And now it's clear who the term belongs to originally. 

K

Mumbai

I have to admit I was a little apprehensive of coming to Mumbai after the attacks.  I was in NY and London during their respective terrorist attacks.  I'd like to think that I have come a ways forward since I was so negatively affected in 2001 and 2005.  Retrospectively, I probably should have been more worried about going to Goa, as that would be a prime target for western tourists.  Now that I'm here I think this is my favorite Indian city.  Granted I have not been to most of the Indian cities, but I like this so much, I don't think any will surpass it.  I enjoyed Kolkata, it challenged me to be there, in a good way, and I came to appreciate the city, but I'm pretty sure I couldn't live there.  Mumbai on the other hand, I think I could live here.  Leave it to me to like the most expensive Indian city, where you end up paying half a million dollars for a flat! There is just the right mix here of cosmopolitan Globalia and traditional Indian. 

 

We are staying in Colaba, a trendy shopping area in the southern part of Mumbai.  We are only a few blocks away from the Taj Palace, which of course we had to go in when we saw it.  It is a huge imposing building on the waterfront opposite the gateway of India.  I loved that the tourists (all Indian) on the first night we saw it were taking two photos.  First, one with everyone in front of the Gateway of India, then another with everyone in front of the Taj.  (Then sometimes a third,  with us.)

 

Although the internet cafe I'm in is cool, why travel if I'm going to sit on the computer? so I will just mention a few things I'd like to share. 

 

The Dhaba-Wallahs, go look them up.  They are amazing.  They deliver lunches all over Mumbai and despite making 5000 deliveries a day, their system is so well designed, they make one mistake in 6 million. 

 

The dhobi ghats - a laundry place.  I can't describe the place, you've gotta look them up, hopefully there will be a picture. 

 

Tomorrow we are taking a tour through Asia's largest slum.  I know that sounds a little strange, but you do it with a guide company that puts 80% of its profits back into the community.  And I should also mention that even though it is a "slum", because of its lack of infastructure, it has a turnover of $700 million due to the small scale enterprises run within the slum.  We can't take pictures inside, which I think is fair enough, so I'll try to explain more once we see it.

 

We have seen more and eaten fantastic food, but I think that's it for now. 

 

All the best,

Katie